Bob-White, Male
In winter Bob-Whites frequent old weed-patches, briar-thickets, or cornfields where the stalks have been left standing. They are very sociable, and wander about in flocks, searching for food, roosting together on the ground in a compact ring, their heads out and tails together. Being protectively colored, they usually do not fly until they are virtually tramped upon. When a flock is disturbed, they rush into the air on noisy wings and scatter in all directions. After a short time the birds begin to call to each other, pur-lee, pur-lee, and the flock reassembles.
With the coming of spring the flocks break up. Male birds mount favorite fence-posts, stones, or low boughs and give the clear whistle which every farmer boy can imitate. This whistle is one of the clearest and most powerful of bird-notes.
Male and female birds share the duties of incubating the eggs, which are turned over carefully so that they get the proper amount of heat. Sometimes the eggs are so numerous that they are piled upon each other in the nest, and at such times the lower layer of eggs must receive special attention. As a rule, all the eggs hatch.
Among the enemies of Bob-Whites are the blacksnake, which eats the eggs and young; the Cooper’s Hawk and the Goshawk, which capture the adults; and the skunk and other ground-prowlers which eat the eggs and sometimes the adults. Half-starved house cats are frequently serious enemies of this popular game-bird.
The Hungarian or European Gray Partridge (Perdix perdix perdix), a bird a little larger than the Bob-White, gray in color with a dark brown horse-shoe shaped mark on the breast, a red-brown tail, and reddish eyelids, has been released in several parts of Pennsylvania as a game-bird, and it is now on the increase. The bright red-brown tail of this species is very noticeable in flight.
RUFFED GROUSE
Bonasa umbellus umbellus (Linnæus)
Other Names.—Partridge; Gray Partridge; Birch Partridge; Silver-tail (gray phase); Pheasant (erroneous).
Description.—Size of chicken, with broad, fan-shaped tail; sexes similar. Upperparts principally reddish brown, irregularly marked with black, buffy, gray, and whitish; sides of neck with ruffs of broad, black feathers glossed with greenish; tail reddish brown or gray, or of intermediate shade, irregularly barred and mottled with black, with a broad blackish band near end, and a gray tip; throat and breast buffy; rest of underparts white, tinged with buffy and barred with black or dark brown, the bars indistinct on the breast and belly, stronger on the sides. The female, which is a little smaller, has smaller ruffs on the neck, and, as a rule, a shorter tall. Length: 17 inches.
Range in Pennsylvania.—A permanent resident throughout in the wilder, wooded sections; variable in abundance as a result of unfavorable nesting seasons, change of forest conditions, destruction by natural enemies, disease, and heavy hunting.
Nest.—A hollow lined with leaves at the base of a stump, under a low hemlock, or under the fallen branch of a tree. Eggs: 7 to 14, pale buffy.
Ruffed Grouse