Duo. SI, y 



D. 



■ 1885.] 



^ i the sj ii ' r,. - — 



■«^e 'vital spf 



8trc'-9-*v^°-+-r' i'red-head shooting at Chatauqua Lake; and have 

 sa l^'^the great prairies of Illinois, and by the bapks of 



3 harge*tid Rock rivers have loaded my game bag with the 

 ^oiis to quail and grouse. 



Then at my little bowers I resumed work with the poetic 

 pen, which I had begun to use with Longfellow, atBowdoin, 

 in contributing; to Mr. Bryant's United States Literary Gazette. 

 This work of imagination was continued in the hours of rest 

 from the toils of the chase; and so 1 then devoted myself 

 almost exclusively to descriptions of sport, seeking to_ trans- 

 fer to paper the scenes in which I moved, and describing the 

 habits and habitat of the game and fish of forest and waters. 

 Being an ardent admirer of natural scenery and of natural 

 history, 1 sought to photograph in verse these creatures of 

 nature, and so prepare a volume that I might humbly call a 

 work of natural history. 



The fowl shooter sailing over breezy bay or rushing river, 

 the grouse shooter ranging grassy prairies, the quail and 

 partridge shooter tramping over stubble field or penetrating 

 the densest thickets, the angler dropping his line in the 

 brawling brook or casting his flies in pond or river, or seek- 

 ing in the salt sea tides the schools of bass and bluefish, have 

 all rare opportunities to study the habits and varieties of 

 game and fish, and to become not only sportsmen, but poets 

 and naturalists. 



It has been for years our custom to construct a little shanty 

 or bower by the banks of some river or bay, and there enjoy 

 the quiet bliss of the hour and the place. When not watch- 

 ing tbe waters or the woods, it has been our wont to enjoy 

 our book, or the daily or weekly sportsman's journal, varied 

 wi(h an occasional shot from our revolver at the target, or 

 the fragrant solace of the pipe. At such time and place many 

 of the rod and gun poems which have so often for years ap- 

 peared, were composed. They were originally written in 

 pencil on blank sheet of a book or on margin of the perused 

 paper, and afterward transferred in ink to letter paper on 

 return to the house. All these were written for my own 

 amusement, without thought of fee or recompense, and if 

 they have contributed anything of pleasure to brother 

 anglers and shooters, then the writer has gained his "exceeding 

 great reward." And now that he has collected in one family 

 group these fugitive children of his imagination, so that they 

 may rest together under the paternal roof of the volume now 

 being erected by those expert builders, Messrs. Thorpe and 

 Green, he hopes that they may be graciously received and 

 kindly welcomed by his beloved brethren of the rod and 

 gan. Isaac McLellan. 



CtReenport, Dec. 5. 



iiUdreascxU communications to the Forest and Stream Publish- 

 ing Go, 



ARIZONA QUAIL NOTES. 



^itor Forest and Stream: 



Commencing with the 26th of September, in company with 

 imy friend, Mr. Heil Hale, 1 put in a few days collecting in 

 the foothills of the Barboquivari Mountains, one of the bold- 

 est and most noted ranges in Southern Arizona. Its highest 

 point is the Barboquivari Peak, a prominent landmark for 

 nearly one hundred miles. With the northern end I was 

 quite'familiar, and had in years gone by prospected along 

 the western slope, but never before had I followed down the 

 base of the eastern side. 



We entered the Altar Valley at a point about twenty-eight 

 miles southwest of Tucson, followed the valley southward 

 fifteen miles, then turned westward toward the peak, which, 

 over a smooth grass-covered mesa was here distant twenty 

 odd miles. By noon on the 27th we were camped under the 

 shadow of the great rock. 



This trip was one that I had long contemplated taking, 

 and while I purposed to collect generally, the newly made 

 known Bob White was the object of my search. It is of 

 this bird, because of its newness, I purpose to make special 

 mention. New to science and to bird men as a whole, but 

 to every old time resident of Southern Arizona it has long 

 been known and recognized as belonging to the fauna of the 

 country. 



The first public attention called to this bird was an inci- 

 dental mention made by me of it in the Arizona Citizen, nearly 

 two years since. This was copied in Forest and Stkeam, 

 and called forth a contradiction by Mr. Ridgwayof the Smith- 

 sonian Institution, who denied the existence of an Ortyx vir- 

 ginianus in Arizona. This was a surprise to many people 

 here, inasmuch as they, like myself, had till then believed 

 the bird known. On receiving a letter of inquiry from Mr. 

 Grinnell, I forwarded to him such material as was then at 

 my command, an almost pei-fect skin ©f a female and por- 

 tions of wing, breast and tail of a male. These were sub- 

 mitted to Mr. Ridgway and he pronounced them undoubtedly 

 "Ortyx graysoni." On this showing Mr. Grinnell, in Fokest 

 AND (^tkeam of April 24, 1884, announced Ortyx graysoni "a 

 quail new to the United States fauna." He at the same time 

 •on information furnished by myself, gave the range of the 

 bird in Arizona. "In the country lying between the Barbo- 

 quivari range in Arizona and the Gulf coast in Sonora, and 

 more especially between the Barboquivari and the Plumosa, 

 this species is quite abundant. They are to be found on the 

 Sonoite, about sixty miles south of Tucson and perhaps 

 ■thirty miles north of the.Sonora|line. From the Sonoite valley 

 "they can be found to the west for full one hundred miles 

 :and through a strip of country not less than thirty miles in 

 width within the territory. Very possibly they may go 

 ibeyond that both to the eastward and westward." He fur- 

 'ther said, "The habits of the Ortyx graysoni, so far as we 

 ^kuow them, appear to resemble very closely those of the 

 fcommon quail, only shghtly modified by the conditions of 

 itheir environments. They utter the characteristic call, 'Bob 

 White,' with bold full notes, and perch on rocks and bushes 

 when calling. They do not appear to be at all a mountain 

 ibhd, but live on tire mesa, in the valleys, and possibly in 

 ^he foothills." 



This account, I am happy to say, has been fully confirmed 

 by patient inquiry and personal investigation. At this 

 point, so far as the public were concerned, the matter rested 

 till August, 1884, when Mr. Frank Stephens, of San Ber- 

 nardino, CaUt'ornia, at that time collecting in Arizona and 

 Sonora, secured a male bird near Lasabe, in the latter State. 

 This skin he loaned to Mr. Brewster, of Cambridge, Mass., 

 who, in April, 1885, in the Auk, pronounced it a new bird 

 and named it CoUrms ridgicayi, in honor of Mr. Ridgway, 



FOREST ANb StJREAM. 



by whom it was, thirteen months previously, said to be Ortyx 

 graysoni, and as such it was accepted by bird men without 

 question. I showed a pair of skins, male and female, to Mr. 

 E. W. Nelson, when he was here during the early part of 

 the summer of 1884. The same pair were also seen by Mr. 

 H. W. Henshaw when in Tucson at the beginning of the 

 present year. Neither of them doubted the proper identifi- 

 cation of the bird, nor was it doubted hj Mr. W. E. 

 D. Scott, who likewise examined them, so reliant were 

 they on Mr. Ridgway's opinion. Mr. Stephens saw them 

 on his return from Sonora, and recognizing in them the 

 same bird as his own, believed that he, too, ha<l taken 

 an Ortyx graysoni. Later on he loaned the skin with the 

 stated result. 



The "hooded quail" {Golinus ridgway f) was, three years 

 since, abundant in the neighborhood of BoUe's Well, a stage 

 station on the Quijotoa road, near the northern end of the 

 Barboquivari range, 29 miles southwest of Tucson and about 

 40 miles north of the Mexican boundary line. As the sta- 

 tion was then comparatively new, the grass thereabouts was 

 high and these quail could be had for the taking; but now 

 that stock has eaten away the grass, the birds have not, for 

 a year or more, been seen about the place. 



On the road from Bolle's Well west to the Coyote range 

 (about 25 miles), these quail were frequently to be met with, 

 but teamsters and travelers have killed or frightened them 

 ofl:. One of the former assured me that he had killed as 

 many as five at one shot. Ten miles south of Bolle's, in the 

 Altar Valley, we came across a small covey— there were, per- 

 haps, a dozen in all. The bright, deep chestnut breast 

 plumage of the males looked red in the sun, and gave the 

 birds a most magnificent appearance. We secured but one, 

 a male, the rest secreting themselves" in the tall sacaton 

 grass, which at this point was between four and five feet 

 high, and as we had no dog we did not follow them in. Our 

 next place to find them was on the mesa southeast of the 

 Peak, where we camped to hunt for them, but they were 

 scarce, and we managed to secure but few. I will venture 

 to say that when frightened and scattered they are a hard 

 bird to get. Hear one call, locate it as you may, see one fly 

 and mark it down, and without a dog it is virtually impos- 

 sible to flush it. 



In addition to their "Bob White" they have second call of 

 hoo-ioe, articulated and as clean cut as their Bob White. 

 This call of lioo-ice they use when scattered, and more 

 especially do they use it when separated toward nightfall. 

 At this hour I noted that, although they occasionally called 

 "Bob White" they never repeated the first syllable, as in the 

 day time they now and then attempted to do. In body they 

 are plumpness itself. In this respect, considering size, they 

 overmatch the Arizona quail {L. gamheli) with which I com- 

 pared them. In actual size of body, however, the latter is 

 the larger. Its plumed head, fine appearance and true gami- 

 ness of character are advantages in its favor that will ever 

 make it a favorite with sportsmen. 



The base of the Barboquivari range is at intervals broken 

 into immense canyons, which lie at right angles with the 

 main body of of the mountain, and stretch far to the plains 

 below. For a mile or more after leaving the base proper 

 they are filled with an almost impenetrable growth of under- 

 brush, weeds and grass. Lower down, however, they flatten 

 out and largely lose their canyon characteristics, but seldom 

 sufllciently so to be the feeding ground of Golinus ridgwai/i. 

 To determine this point we worked these canyons for two 

 consecutive days in vain, inasmuch as we failed to see or 

 hear one, other than those on the intervening mesas. Ari- 

 zona quail {Lophortyx gambeli), on the other hand, seem 

 partial to a rough country, where such country is possible 

 with them. In the canyons they swarmed by thousands. In 

 this respect I think them peculiar. On our way out we 

 found them plentiful in the rough passes of the Tucson 

 Mountains, but on the plains beyond and in the Altar Valley 

 they disappeared and gave place to the scaled or blue quail 

 {Callipepla squamata). These were likewise plentiful, but 

 they too disappeared almost with the first rise in the mesa. 

 In the canyons, twenty miles above here, we, as elsewhere 

 stated, again met with the Gambels, but we found none of 

 the scaled quail until we again returned to the valley. 

 Between the feeding grounds of these two birds I never saw 

 a line more clearly drawn. In this respect they differ from 

 the ridgwayi, which were found both in the valley and on 

 the mesa. 



Another noticeable feature was the difference in plumage, 

 which was most marked. The Bob White and scaled quail 

 were yet in moult to a degree that rendered it difficult to 

 make good skins, while the Arizona quail were in full plum- 

 age. An explanation of this I would like to see from some 

 one more familiar with bird fife than myself. I found some 

 difference in the food of the different species. I examined 

 the stomachs of probably a dozen birds, among which were 

 three Bob Whites. No. 1 contained a species of mustard 

 seed, a few chapparal berries, and some six or eight bugs 

 and beetles, ranging in length from a half inch down to the 

 size of a pin-head. No. 2 was similarly provided, but had 

 in heu of the mustard seed a grasshopper fully an inch in 

 length. These two were taken ©n the mesa. No. 3 was 

 taken in the valley, and contained about twenty medium- 

 sized red ants, several crescent-shaped seeds, and a large 

 number of small fleshy green leaves. The stomachs of the 

 Arizona quail were filled pretty much alike, all that 1 ex- 

 amined having been taken from the same feeding ground. 

 Hackbcrries and crescent-shaped seeds made up almost the 

 sum total of their Uving. In one only did I find much in- 

 sect life, and it appeared to have struck a bonanza of little 

 bugs.^ I opened the stomach of but one scaled quail. It 

 contained seeds and about a dozen bright red cactus berries. 

 Later on I will more thoroughly examine into this matter of 

 food. 



The breeding season of the scaled quail must be more pro- 

 longed than either of the others, for I saw one brood of prob- 

 ably twenty that was not more than ten days or two weeks 

 old. Of the other two species all seemed fully grown. 

 Among the Arizona quail the males outnumbered the 

 females, it seemed to me, at least five to one, or even more 

 than that. There is a possibility that the females may have 

 kept more to the brush than did" the males, and consequently 

 were less exposed to the gun of the collector, but this can 

 hardly be, inasmuch as we closely examined large bunches of 

 quail on the outside with the same result. 



The investigations above detailed make it appear clear to 

 me that in this vicinity the common form of Golinus, hitherto 

 referred to as Golinus graysoni, is really G. ndgicayi. Whether 

 the former species also occurs can only be determined by 

 further examination of a wide range of country. This I hope 

 to be able to undertake at some future day. 



Herbert Brown. 



Tucson, Arizona, Oct. 30, 1885. 



445 



EXPERIENCE WITH SAVAGE DEER. 



Uditor Forest and Stream: 



The item, "A Pet Deer on the Rampage," in your issue 

 of Dec. 10, reminds me of the story of a "scrimmage" with 

 a wounded buck once told me by the survivor, as we lay at 

 full length on our blankets, spread upon a thick bed of fra- 

 grant balsam boughs, and with our feet stretched toward a 

 blazing pile of hardwood logs, while we_n.ested after a hard 

 day's snowshoing in a forest on the south shore of Lake Su- 

 perior. Having finished our frugal, but abundant, meal of 

 camp bread, bacon and tea, and the pipes lighted, story tell- 

 ing was in order. 



"Spcakin' o' wounded deer fitin'," said S a veteran 



woodsman, explorer and hunter, "did I ever tell you o' the 

 buck I shot with a maple stick ?" 



"No, I don't think you ever did. Let's have it." 



For a few moments S looked into the glowing fire at 



his feet and puffed vigorously at his pipe, while he seemed 

 to see again, through the fragrant smoke and in the living 

 coals, the encounter he was about to describe. The others, 

 knowing his way, smoked in silence until he began: 

 - "It war in 1867, in Muskegon county. Lower Peninsula, 

 I war Uving there then. One day I went out to look for a 

 lost ox, and, o' course, took the ole gun along. It warn't 

 one o' these yer pumps, sech as we use now days, with which 

 ye kin i^ump a deer full o' lead in a rainnit; but it war the 

 best ole muzzleloader I ever see. It carried 'bout sixty to 

 the pound, an' when I drawed a bead on anythin' alive it 

 war 'most alius my meat. After bein' out till noon an' seein' 

 no game 'cept patridges, an' lots o' them, I thought I mout's 

 well take home a mess o' birds, so I commenced poppin' 'em 

 over whenever I got a good chance at their heads. I kep' 

 this up till I found I only had one bullet left, an' that I tho't 

 I'd keep until I got near home. As I war on the way home, 

 I kem to a small lake, an' as I looked over it I see a big buck 

 wadin' across a shallow place in the water. It war a pretty 

 long shot, but I bed made longer with the ole gun, so I 

 banged away. The buck stopped, an' I could tell by the 

 way he acted that he war hit. I got back in the woods an' 

 crawled toward him, an' thar he stood, lookin' all aroun', 

 not knowin' yet where the shot kem from. As I got nearer 

 1 saw that he war bleedin' good, but I war afraid he'd git 

 away. I bed plenty o' powder but no lead. Finally I 

 thought o' the way I'd seen 'em stun pigs 'fore stickin, 'em, 

 by shootin' 'em with a wooden plug an' a small load o' pow- 

 der, an' I thought ef I put a long plug an' a big load o' pow- 

 der in the old gun mebbe I could down him. I laid low an' 

 whittled a green maple sprout down to fit the gun an' cut it 

 off 'bout six or eight inches long an' put 'bout three inches 

 o' powder in the ole gun, put on a patch jest as though it 

 war a bullet, an' rammed my stick down an' put on a cap. 

 Then I raised up an' took a look at the buck. He war sick 

 an' stood still yet, but he war too fur away fer my wood 

 bullet, so I waded out toward him, ready to shoot ef he 

 should start to run. But he only looked at me, an' once in 

 a while he'd shake his head or stomp his foot in the water, 

 which was only 'bout knee keep. I kep' a walkin' up until 

 I war 'bout fifty feet away, an' then I aimed fer his neck an' 

 blazed away. Well, sir, 'fore I got the gun away from my 

 shoulder that buck bed me on his horns a swashiu' me around 

 in the water so't I thought he war goin' ter bail the lake out 

 with me. It didn't last but a minnit, an' it didn't need ter, 

 ter make me think the air was full o' bucks an' water. Then 

 he fell with his head in the water, an' me on top, an' in a 

 minnit more he were dead. He had bled so much that he 

 war 'most dead when I fired the last time, an' it war just as 

 well fer me that he war, fer it war the almightiest h'ustlin' 

 ever I got, an' if a dead buck kin shake a man up like that 

 I don't want no truck with a live one at short rang'e." After 

 a pause, "An' I never hit him with the wooden plug." 



Jay Embll. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



Something in the paper concerning the viciousness of tame 

 deer reminds me of an encounter of my father and a cousin 

 of his, with a tame doe. My father was about fourteen, his 

 cousin four years or so younger, when one "Fifth Day" after 

 Friends' Meeting, my grandfather sent them to a field in 

 sight of the meeting house to get a clevis that had been left 

 on a stump. While going or coming the deer attacked them, 

 rearing up and striking with her forefeet. She made at the 

 younger boy first and knocked him down, when my father's 

 lusty cries for help drew her attention to him. He had the 

 presence of mind to fall face downward, and after thumping 

 him on the back a few times, the doe renewed her attack 

 upon the smaller boy, who was too much frightened to 

 guard himself at aU, and was quite seriously hurt before my 

 father's shouts brought a party of stout Quakers to the 

 rescue. 



Uncle Byrd, cousin Tom's father, presently "sot down and 

 wrote a letter" to Martin Shellhouse, the owner of the doe, 

 that caused sentence of death to be passed upon her and 

 speedily enforced. I was not there and it happened some 

 years further back than my recollection runs, about 1810, 

 but I was well acquainted with my father, and have no 

 doubt of the truth of the story, which he circumstantially 

 narrated to me several hundred times during my boyhood. 



AWAHSOOSE. 



Hare and Of^E^n.— Editor Forest and SPream: While 

 hunting caribou in the Laurentian Mountains, north of this, 

 a few days ago, on approaching one of the numerous lakes 

 that abound in that range I observed a hare crossing a bay 

 ^at a distance of 300 or 400 yards from where I stood, run-, 

 ning at the top of its speed. While watching the hare I 

 observed at some distance behind it an animaf which I at 

 once took to be an otter, from its appearance when it sat 

 up on the ice, as it did the moment I noticed it, having no 

 doubt heard my man calling my attention to the hare. This 

 man, who has passed most of his life in these woods, imme- 

 diately exclaimed, "Une loutre" (an otter). On my firing at 

 it, it started again in the same track the hare had taken, 

 making quick, clean jumps, and covering at each about the 

 same space as the hare had done. Another shot from my 

 rifle and the animal took its back track and disappeared in 

 the woods whence it had come in pursuit of the hare. What 

 I want to know from yourself or any of your correspondents 

 is, do otters chase or capture hares, or would they eat a hare? 

 If not an otter, what animal would it probably be? It was 

 not a black fox. — H. R. (Montreal). 



LrvE Elk aijd Antelopes. — A Wyoming correspondent 

 writes us: "I have a live male elk, very tame, and a nice 

 pet. It will follow me anywhere and eat anything. I have 

 also two live antelopes; they are very gentle, and make in- 

 teresting pets. All are sound, hearty and thrifty." We be- 

 lieve that these are for sale. 



