Outing . chicken dogs, I thrashed over sev-eral sections of bunch-grass land wherechickens were common and known tonest each year, but without success. Ifound no hens off the nests during theheat of the day, but quite frequently sawthem flying to the feeding grounds aftertwilight. Several times while huntingtheir nests I felt sure that I was withina few feet of the sitting birds, but wascompelled to give up the search. Thehens are close, hard sitters, and very fewnests are found. Prairie fires exposemany nests and are the nesting hensworst enemy. The nuptial performances of the cocksare simila
Outing . chicken dogs, I thrashed over sev-eral sections of bunch-grass land wherechickens were common and known tonest each year, but without success. Ifound no hens off the nests during theheat of the day, but quite frequently sawthem flying to the feeding grounds aftertwilight. Several times while huntingtheir nests I felt sure that I was withina few feet of the sitting birds, but wascompelled to give up the search. Thehens are close, hard sitters, and very fewnests are found. Prairie fires exposemany nests and are the nesting hensworst enemy. The nuptial performances of the cocksare similar to those of the common va-riety, but the ventriloquial drummingsound does not appear to be quite so roll-ing nor voluminous. In May, 1907, Iput up in the heart of the nesting-ground, where I had an excellent oppor-tunity to study their habits. The cocksgenerally select for drumming-ground aslight rise covered with buffalo grass,where they gather each spring for thenuptial performance. They are very par-. THE AUTHOR WITH A GOOD BUNCH THE LESSER PRAIRIE II 611 tial to their drumming-grounds, andeven though disturbed will return totheir old haunts year after year. I sawone drumming-ground that had beenused for many years. Here the cocks would gather some-times as high as fifty birds to performtheir antics. The drumming of so manycocks would be of such volume as tosound like distant thunder. Hens at-tracted by the drumming would cause eleven ounces to a pound fourteenounces. The plumage is of a muchlighter brown and is more suffused withtawny than is the plumage of the com-mon prairie hen. During the summermonths they feed largely on grasshop-pers, but in the fall and winter theyfeed almost entirely on kaffir corn andmaize, cane seed, and other varieties ofsemi-arid cereals. As to the palatable-ness of the meat I much prefer duck.
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade, booksubjectsports, booksubjecttravel
