94 THE OREGON SPORTSMAN 



I approached very slowly and got up within a few feet of 

 the mother as she sat on the nest warming the chicks. She purred 

 and talked to them just as a cat does when it is anxious about 

 the kittens. She mewed in a kind of a subdued way. I have often 

 found that a mother bird will make unusual sounds when scared 

 and anxious for her young. 



Several times I have examined shells in the nest of a Ruffed 

 Grouse after the chicks have hatched. They were all opened the 

 same way, as if by machinery. The chick pounds a little hole 

 in one place in the egg, then he withdraws his bill and turns 

 slightly and pecks another hole. This is continued until he makes 

 a complete revolution in the shell and the cap drops off. In this 

 way the top of the large end of the egg is cut around very evenly. 



The enemies of the Ruffed Grouse are many, just as are the 

 enemies of all game birds. No matter whether it is down in the 

 valley where there is an uncleared patch of woods with fields 

 surrounding, whether it is along the river bank where the rose 

 briar, vine maple and ash trees grow thick so as to form abundant 

 cover, or whether it is in the deep forests far back in the 

 mountains, it is my experience that about all the Ruffed Grouse 

 can do is to hold his own. I remember certain places where I 

 have gone year after year and I was always sure to find one or 

 two of these birds. During the winter I could flush them almost 

 any day. In the spring they would nest and bring off a brood 

 of from six to ten birds, but after the fall and winter season most 

 of the young birds are killed from one cause or another. If one 

 or two remain they spread out to some other place. For all the 

 protection we have ever given the Ruffed Grouse, his numbers 

 do not increase. If it is far back in the mountains, the bobcats 

 and hawks and owls keep the numbers of grouse down. I re- 

 member on the upper headwaters of the Willamette during the 

 winter of 1913, seeing where two Ruffed Grouse had been killed 

 by a Goshawk. In one case I came upon the hawk just after 

 he had killed the grouse. He picked up the bird, and flew away 

 with it. But the enemies of the grouse are just as abundant down 

 in the valley where the county is settled, for here instead of bob- 

 cats are tame house cats that are always on the hunt. 



The Ruffed Grouse is called Partridge in the northern states, 

 but in the south and west it is called Pheasant. Here in Oregon 



