File:American game-bird shooting (1910) (14568819428).jpg

Identifier: americangamebird00grin (find matches)
Title: American game-bird shooting
Year: 1910 (1910s)
Authors: Grinnell, George Bird, 1849-1938
Subjects: Game and game-birds Hunting
Publisher: New York, Forest and stream publishing company
Contributing Library: Smithsonian Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: Smithsonian Libraries

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sport, never turning it into downright slaugh-ter, and leaving birds enough and to spare. And withit all we had a good time. At the approach of cold weather the birds gathertogether in large flocks and pack, as the term is, re-maining in these packs all through the winter. At thistime they are shy, will not lie for a dog, get up at aconsiderable distance and fly a long way. An interesting account of the birds at this time waswritten by Latrobe in his Rambler in America. La-trobe accompanied Washington Irving and one or twoother friends on an expedition to what was then theFar West—beyond the Missouri River, and like mostEnglishmen did not let pass the opportunity to getsome shooting. In 1832 he wrote of his efforts to shoot someprairie fowl. This was in Indian summer, at a timewhen the squirrels were at work among the dead leavesbeneath the hickory and pecan trees near the OsageAgency, and when countless bands of water fowls andflights of pigeons, which had been constantly observed
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SHOOTING THE PRAIRIE GROUSE 411 passing to the southward during a season of cold, hadceased to be a source of wonderment. He says: The prairie fowl had now completely thrown asidetheir summer habits. Instead of keeping apart in dis-tinct families, scattered over a vast extent of country,like our grouse at an earlier season, they now appearedcongregated in immense flocks in the immediate vi-cinity of the farms. I had plenty of opportunity ofstudying their habits, but to shoot a few brace, asthey were extremely wild, required frequently hoursof patient and wary exertion; whereas at an earlierseason a sportsman, if aided by a dog, might bag anyquantity from the pertinacity with which they will lieclose until forced to fly. It appeared that at this time of the year all the birdswithin an area of three or four miles square congre-gated together by consent at sundown on a given spotin the rank dried grass of the unburnt prairie tosleep. Many a time have I seen them coming at sun-set from ev

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