Part 100

var. richardsoni.

1. Canace obscurus. ♂ Rocky Mts., 19159. 2. Canace obscurus. ♀ Rocky Mts., 19166. 3. Canace franklini. ♂ Rocky Mts., 398. 4. Canace richardsoni. N. Rocky Mts. 5. Canace canadensis. ♂ Nova Scotia, 12564. 6. Canace canadensis. ♀ Nova Scotia, 12565.]

Canace obscurus, var. obscurus, SAY.

DUSKY GROUSE.

Tetrao obscurus, SAY, Long’s Exped. R. Mts. II, 1823, 14.—BON. Mon. Tetrao, Am. Phil. Trans. III, 1830, 391.—IB. Am. Orn. III, 1830, pl. xviii.—BAIRD, Birds N. Am. 1858, 620.—SCL. P. Z. S. 1858, 1.—GRAY, Cat. Brit. Mus. V, 1867, 86.—COOP. Orn. Cal. I, 1870, 526 (in part). Canace obscura, BONAP. Comptes Rendus, XLV, 1857, 428. Dendragapus obscurus, ELLIOT, P. A. N. S. 1864, 23.—IB. Monog. Tetraon. pl.

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.

Mr. George Gibbs informed Dr. Suckley that he has met with the Dusky Grouse as far south as the Russian River Mountains, in California, and found it also common on the east side of the Cascades, as far north as the 49th parallel.

Dr. Cooper’s account of these birds is substantially similar to the account given by Dr. Suckley of the fuliginosus. He found it common in most of the forests, especially in the dense spruce woods near the coast. It was rarely seen on the open prairie. In the dense woods it was exceedingly difficult to detect. During May, near the coast, and till August, on the mountains, the low tooting of this Grouse was heard everywhere, sounding something like the cooing of a Pigeon, but in the same deep tone as the drumming of the Ruffed Grouse. Dr. Cooper also mentions its remarkable powers of ventriloquism, so that while the bird may be sitting on a tree directly over your head the sound seems to come from places quite remote.

Dr. Woodhouse states that the Dusky Grouse is found among the mountains about Santa Fé, in New Mexico.

This Grouse was first met with by Mr. Ridgway on the Sierra Nevada, in the vicinity of Carson City, where it was seen in the possession of Indians who had been hunting on the mountains. It was found on the East Humboldt Mountains, in the month of September, and at that time occurred in small flocks, consisting chiefly of young birds, and probably composed of single families. Afterwards, in the summer of 1869, it was found in considerable abundance in Parley’s Park, a few miles from Salt Lake City. It there chiefly inhabited the copses of scrub-oaks along the lower border of coniferous woods. In July it was found in the Uintah Mountains in very great abundance, and for a while formed the chief subsistence of the party. It was there known as the Mountain Grouse. Nothing very distinctive was ascertained in regard to its habits, except that it was said to resemble very closely, in manners, the Ruffed Grouse. Its flesh was excellent eating.

Dr. Suckley, in a series of papers on the Grouse of the United States which were read before the New York Lyceum in 1860, states that this species probably extend their range to quite a distance south of latitude 40° along the line of the Rocky Mountains, in New Mexico. This writer claimed to have met with them near Pike’s Peak, in the Cheyenne Pass, and in 1853 he found them in great numbers in Lewis and Clarke’s Pass, west of Fort Benton. He also found them abundantly in Oregon and on the slopes of the Cascade and Coast Ranges, extending wherever pine or fir timber occurs, to the very borders of the ocean. The Black Hills, in Nebraska, he gives as their most eastern limit.

The same author corrects the statements of Douglas as to certain habits of this species. The males are said not to be particularly pugnacious, and very rarely forsake the boughs of the pine or fir trees for a rocky eminence. They feed on berries only during a brief season in autumn, at all other times of the year subsisting upon the leaves of the pine and fir, especially those of the Douglas Fir. This food imparts a strong resinous flavor to the flesh of this Grouse, which, however, is not unpleasant, and after a while becomes quite attractive to the epicure. The love-notes of this bird are said to be deep, soft, plaintive, but unmusical, and resemble the whirring sounds made by a rattan, swung rapidly and in jerks through the air. These notes usually begin the first week in March. The young are able to fly feebly by the first of July. By the last of August they have attained their full size. In the winter they retire to the tops of the loftiest firs, where they pass the season in an almost immovable state of hibernation. Between July and winter they may be readily shot. Once raised, they invariably fly to trees. They heed but little the report of a gun unless they have been wounded. Their flesh is said to be midway between the color of the Pinnated and the Ruffed Grouse, partaking of their good qualities, but surpassing either.

The eggs of this species are oval in shape; one end is a little more obtuse than the other. The ground is of a pale cream-color, and is marked with small rounded spots of reddish-brown. These are more numerous and larger towards the larger end. They measure 1.95 inches in length and 1.45 in breadth.

Canace obscurus, var. fuliginosus, RIDGWAY.

OREGON DUSKY GROUSE.

? Tetrao obscurus, NEWBERRY, P. R. R. Rept. VI, iv, 1857, 93.—COOP. & SUCKL. 219.—LORD, Pr. R. A. Inst. IV, 122 (British Columbia).—DALL & BANNISTER, Trans. Chicago Ac. I, 1869, 287 (Alaska).—FINSCH, Ab. Nat. III, 1872, 61 (Alaska).

SP. CHAR. Beneath plain dark plumbeous, without whitish borders to the feathers except on flanks and crissum; whole head almost uniformly plain dusky-black. Tarsi dark plumbeous. Wing, 9.50; tail, 7.50; tarsus, 1.75; middle toe, 1.80.

Female (11,826, Chiloweyuck Depot, Washington Territory, Aug. 6, 1858; C. B. Kennerly). Above black, broken by transverse mottlings of bright reddish-brown or rufous; these confused posteriorly, but in form of regular transverse bars anteriorly. Below dusky-plumbeous, plain on abdomen, with sagittate spots on jugulum, and deltoid ones on the flanks, etc., of reddish-white. Length, 20.00; wing, 8.50; tail, 6.30.

Adult male (4,505, Cascade Mountains, Dr. Newberry). Above plain fuliginous-black, the mottlings scarcely apparent. No white markings on scapulars; tail-band deep plumbeous, only .60 wide, but well defined.

Young (11,827, Chiloweyuck Depot). Similar to, but much more reddish than, young of var. obscurus.

HAB. Northwest coast region, from Oregon to Sitka.

A male (46,070, May, 1866; Bischoff) from Sitka is much mottled with bright reddish-rusty on the dorsal region, and washed with the same on the forehead. (Tail-band .60 of an inch wide). A female (46,073, Sept., 1866) from same locality is so strongly washed with dark, almost castaneous, ferruginous as to appear mostly of this color above, this being very bright on the crown and forehead.