THE RUFFED GROUSE, AND OTHERS 
245 
names are Blue, Pine, and Gray Grouse, and 
also Pine-Hen. I first saw it alive in the 
Shoshone Mountains, while skirting a very 
steep mountain-side in search of mountain- 
sheep. The stunted pines that struggle with 
the slide-rock for existence, were not more than 
thirty feet high, but in them perched, dan- 
gero.usly near the ground, this handsome slaty- 
blue Grouse. Its nearest neighbors were the 
mountain -sheep, elk, magpie, Clarke’s nut- 
cracker, and golden eagle. 
This fine bird ranges up to timber-line, but 
loves rough mountain-sides that are partially 
covered with pines, cedars and firs. It usually 
lives alone, but sometimes forms very small 
flocks. The crop of a specimen which I shot 
was stuffed full of fresh, green pine needles, 
some of them two inches long. At that time, 
however, the snow was a foot deep. 
This bird is recognizable by the broad, white 
band across the end of its tail, and its slaty- 
blue color. From Alaska to California is found 
a subspecies, very much like the preceding, 
called the Sooty Grouse. From western Mon- 
tana to the Coast Range in Oregon and Wash- 
ington, and northward to Alaska, is found the 
Franklin Grouse, known very generally as the 
“Fool Flen,” because it trusts too much to 
man’s humanity, and often finds itself a victim 
of misplaced confidence. This is one of the 
last American birds to learn that man is a very 
dangerous animal, and often devoid both of 
mercy and of appreciation of the beautiful in 
bird-life. 
The Canada Grouse , 1 also called the Spruce- 
Grouse and Black “ Partridge,” is, as its most 
acceptable name implies, the grouse of Canada 
and the Northwest. It has the widest range of 
any American member of the Grouse Family, — 
from the Alaskan Peninsula southeastward to 
northern Minnesota, Michigan, New York and 
New England. It inhabits the evergreen forests 
of that vast region, usually in very small flocks. 
It does not really migrate, but by reason of 
seasonal changes which affect, its food supply, 
it often shifts from one locality to another. (D. 
G. Elliot.) 
In many localities it is known as the “Fool 
Hen,” — a name which is applied in various 
1 Ca-nach'i-tes canadensis can-a'ce. Length, about 
14 inches. 
places to several other species. Man is so con- 
scious of his own insensate destructiveness, and 
so accustomed to seeing all wild creatures fly in 
terror before his baneful presence, he naturally 
feels that any bird which trusts its life to his 
tender mercies, and does not live in constant 
fear of him, must indeed be a feathered fool! 
For some strange reason, several members of the 
Grouse Family are surprisingly slow to com- 
prehend man’s true nature, and acquire the 
flight instinct, which most other species learn by 
experience in a few generations of contact with 
the Universal Killer. 
The male Canada Grouse is readily recognized 
by its black breast and throat, and black tail, 
which handsomely set off the barred gray back 
and sides. 
The Pinnated Grouse, or Prairie-Chicken , 2 
lives chiefly in the memories of those who from 
1860 to 1875 were “ Western men,” or boys. At 
that time, Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa, and 
the states adjoining, were the “West.” Rail- 
roads were few, all guns were muzzle-loaders, 
and the game-dealers of Chicago were not 
stretching out their deadly tentacles, like so 
many long-armed octopi, to suck the last drop 
CAN ADA GROUSE. 
of wild-game blood from prairie and forest. 
The “market-shooter” was a species of game- 
butcher then unknown, and the beautiful, fer- 
tile prairies, and prairie-farms of Illinois, Wis- 
consin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Kansas and 
2 Tym-pa-nu' chus americanus. Average length of 
male, 18 inches. 
