Canace obscurus.
Sp. Char. Male (19,161, Deer Creek, Neb., Feb. 13; G. H. Trook.) Ground-color above slaty-black, but this almost completely overlaid by a minute, transverse mottling of bluish-ash,—pale brown on scapulars and secondaries,—mostly on terminal portion of the feathers. Scapulars with a conspicuous shaft-streak and terminal spot of white. Terminal band of tail sharply and abruptly defined, pure pale bluish-ash, and 1.50 inches in width. Tail slightly rounded (about .80). Lower parts fine bluish-ashy, becoming lighter posteriorly, more plumbeous anteriorly. On the sides of the jugulum the feathers snowy-white beneath the surface, and this much exposed, producing a somewhat broken but conspicuous patch. Throat white, with transverse crescentic bars of dusky; this barred white curving upward to the auriculars, behind a uniformly blackish malar patch; lores and post-ocular region with distinct white spots, producing an inconspicuous stripe from the bill through the eye. All the feathers of the lower parts margined terminally with white, this growing broader on the flanks and crissum, the former of which have a more brownish and mottled ground, and broad white shaft-stripes. Lining of wing almost wholly white. Tarsi ashy-white. Length, 21.00; wing, 10.00; tail, 8.00; tarsus, 1.80; middle toe, 1.80.
Female (58,636, Uintah Mountains, July 5, 1868; R. Ridgway). Somewhat similar to male in pattern. Dusky-black above, much broken by narrow transverse bars of yellowish-brown; these broad, regular, and sharply defined anteriorly, posteriorly broken and mottled. Middle tail-feathers much mottled, obscuring the ashy tip: ash beneath unbroken only on the abdomen; the jugulum, sides, etc., having transverse bars of yellowish-brown. Wing, 8.70; tail, 6.00.
Young (58,658, Uintah Mountains, July 5, 1868; R. Ridgway). Above yellowish-brown, the feathers with conspicuous shaft-streaks and deltoid terminal spots of white; both webs with large, transverse, roundish spots of black; secondaries with six bands of black and white, both broken, however, by coarse mottlings; tail like the secondaries. Beneath dull whitish; jugulum and sides with rounded spots of black, those on opposite webs not joining. Head yellowish-white, crown spotted with black; an indistinct dusky stripe over lores and upper edge of auriculars.
Hab. Rocky Mountain region of the United States, principally south of South Pass, and Sierra Nevada, north to Oregon and south to San Francisco Mountains, New Mexico.
The “Dusky Grouse” figured and described by Mr. Audubon of this species, is not the bird of Say, nor based on specimens collected by Townsend. The figures were probably taken from the skins in possession of Mr. Sabine, referred to by Bonaparte in American Ornithology (Vol. III, 1828, 36), which Sabine proposed to name after Richardson. Douglas, in describing his Tetrao richardsoni, quotes “Sabine MSS.,” but does not describe his specimens, and, as far as his incomplete description goes, seems to have had the true T. obscurus before him. Richardson’s description and figure belong to the second species, the same with Audubon’s. Wilson’s figures, in Illustrations of Zoölogy, 1831 (plates xxx, xxxi), are taken from specimens received from Mr. Sabine, of the same species, but in different and less perfect plumage than Mr. Audubon’s.
Habits. This species was first discovered and described by Say in 1820, though its existence had previously been known to the fur-trappers. Its food consists of various berries, and the flesh is said to be very palatable.
Dr. Newberry pronounces this Grouse decidedly the handsomest of all the American birds of this family; its flesh white, and fully equal to that of the eastern Ruffed Grouse or Quail. It is said to inhabit the evergreen forests exclusively, and to be found not uncommonly in the Sierra Nevada, as well as in the wooded districts of the country lying between the Sacramento Valley and the Columbia. In the Cascade Mountains Dr. Newberry found it associated with the Ruffed Grouse, which it resembles in habits more than any other species. When on the ground they lie very close, flying up from your very feet as you approach them, and, when flushed, always take to a tree, from which they cannot be dislodged except by shooting them. In the spring the male sits motionless on a branch of a pine or a spruce, and utters a booming call, which, by its remarkable ventriloquial powers, seems rather to mislead than to direct the sportsman, unless he is experienced in shooting this kind of Grouse.