200 ANNALS OF SCOTTISH NATURAL HISTORY 



suitable spots where bell-heather or grass predominated ; 

 and this transplanted heather continues to flourish and is 

 spreading, though in places it can still be recognised as a 

 more or less rectangular patch, distinct from its surround- 

 ings. Water-holes were also dug wherever the supply was 

 insufficient, or not easily accessible ; and in the following 

 season the reward of this forethought was reaped, for the 

 birds not only bred, but successfully brought their young to 

 maturity. Of these birds, on 26th August 1878 the Admiral 

 shot five, the first-fruits of Tentsmuir. 



For a good many years the Grouse now continued 

 steadily to hold their own, and in fact considerably increased 

 in numbers. I do not know whether any were killed in 

 1879, but in the seven years from 1880 to 1886 inclusive, 

 an average bag of just 20 brace was obtained ; the best year 

 being 1883 (28 brace) while the largest individual bag 

 was that of 7th August 1886, when 14 brace were killed by 



two guns. 



On this level moor the birds, which breed early, are 

 often packed and unapproachable by the beginning of 

 August. Perhaps an undue proportion of old birds, whose 

 numbers only a system of "driving" would have reduced, 

 escaped the gun altogether, and the breeding vigour of the 

 stock may thus have tended to deteriorate. A host of 

 enemies were also to be reckoned with. The moor, lying as 

 it does within the general lines of the great North and 

 South Migration Roads, as well as near to extensive tracts 

 of land on which there is no preservation of game whatever, 

 is visited and inhabited by swarms of crows hooded, carrion, 

 and hybrid ever on the look-out for a clutch of eggs or a 

 brood of young birds ; and worse even than the crows are 

 the egg-gatherers from the centres of population in the 

 neighbourhood, whose depredations are still, I regret to say, 

 carried on with a success which, to a bird-lover, is nothing 

 short of heart-rending. The hot summer of 1887 must have 

 been a trying one for the grouse ; for in such a season even 

 constant deepening of the water-holes hardly avails to keep 

 up the birds' supply of water. The bag this year was only 

 6^ brace, and, fresh blood being desiderated, in the latter end 

 of November nine hen birds were procured from Kirk- 



