34 
GROUSE FAMILY. 
arrest them. They are even smoked to death in the same 
manner as the Wild Pigeons in the Western country, while 
sleeping harmlessly and unsuspectingly on their leafy roosts. 
By this system of indiscriminate e.xtirpation they are now 
greatly thinned throughout the more populous parts of the 
Union, and sell in Philadelphia and New York from seventy- 
five cents to a dollar apiece. The common price of these 
birds (decidedly, as I think with Audubon, superior in flavor 
to the Pinnated Grouse) is in the market of Boston from 40 
to 50 cents the pair, showing liow much more abundant the 
species is in the rocky regions of New England than in any 
other part of America. Deleterious effects have sometimes 
occurred from eating this game, supposed to arise from their 
feeding on the buds of the broad-leaved Kalmia; yet most 
persons eat them with safety at all seasons of the year, even 
when these kind of buds have been found almost filling the 
stomach. 
The systematists have recently separated the Ruffed Grouse dis- 
tributed over the Northern and Middle States from those found 
along the northern border of New England and in Canada, making 
the latter a sub-species and giving to it the name of Canadian 
Ruffed Grouse {B. tnnbellus torgata). 
The Canadian race is in general darker colored, and lacks a 
reddish tinge on the back; also the markings of the under parts 
are more conspicuous. 
“ Birch Partridges,” as they are commonly called by the gunners 
of northern Maine and the Maritime Provinces, are still fairly 
abundant, though the markets have been generously supplied with 
tliem every year. 
