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reccurrent epidemic, starvation faces the greatly augmented forces of the 
rabbit-eaters that but lately found life so comfortable and increase so 
easy. The numbers must be adjusted to a reduced food supply and 
thousands die by starvation and attendant evils, but not until every possible 
source of food supply is exhausted. Fat hunters grow lean and turn their 
attention to game and to hunting methods that in times of plenty are 
regarded with indifference, and everything of food value suffers accordingly. 
Competition becomes keen; raptores hunt farther afield, trespassing 
upon their neighbours’ preserves, and the stress is intensified. Many wander 
far in their hungry search and invade localities where they do not normally 
appear. The keenest pinch naturally occurs in winter and then the resident 
Grouse and upland game birds suffer severely. On our prairies may be an 
influx of coyotes, Goshawks, and large Owls from the north, which, with 
the usual resident vermin, turn to the Prairie Chicken, Sharp-tailed, and 
other Grouse as the most available food supply, and hunt them with system- 
atic persistence. The Grouse naturally suffer proportionately, and by 
the time their enemies are reduced to normal numbers, may be sadly 
depleted. When the tide turns, however, it does so decisively. 
Rabbits are astonishingly prolific and increase faster than all their enemies 
combined. The enemies, now tremendously reduced in numbers, again 
turn their attention to their natural furry prey; the food supply exceeding 
the demand, the wandering raptores return to their former ranges. The 
resident vermin have been reduced by the bitter competition with the 
visitors and the Grouse are again free from intensive persecution. Life 
becomes comparatively easy and undisturbed for them. Only the strongest 
and most vigorous have survived, large clutches of eggs are laid, and unless 
other deterrent circumstances arise they soon regain their wonted 
numbers. 
Besides these climatic and raptorial influences, probably, as is the 
case with the rabbits, epidemic disease and parasites play no small part 
in the vicissitudes of the Grouse and their allies. These birds are to a large 
extent gregarious, and disease can be readily communicated. Some seasons 
we find many birds infested with parasitic worms, and showing other 
evidences of diseases that doubtless have much to do with their sudden 
reduction in number. How many of these diseases have been introduced 
with our domestic poultry it is difficult to say, but such an origin is 
probable. 
Shooting should not be overlooked as a cause of great reduction, but 
the fact that in notoriously poor Grouse years the birds are as scarce in 
un-shot as in well-shot covers, indicates that it is not always a primary, 
though it may often be a contributing, cause. No species, however numerous, 
can successfully withstand persistent, unregulated, or excessive shooting, but 
just what constitutes excessive shooting varies with the locality, the season, 
and passing conditions. Shooting that but keeps a numerous thrifty species 
in reasonable control will annihilate it when already depleted by other 
causes. Consequently laws for the protection of Grouse have to be con- 
tinually altered and adjusted to conditions, but even in spite of the best of 
laws thoroughly enforced in both letter and spirit, upland game must be 
expected to fluctuate in numbers and years of plenty be followed by 
scarcity, at which times every endeavour must be made to assist recuper- 
ation. 
