268 SCIENCE PROGRESS 



etc., and outlay on building, equipping, and maintaining shoot- 

 ing-lodges. These indirect profits cannot be very exactly stated, 

 but a fair estimate of their amount may be obtained when it 

 is stated that it is the combined experience of shooting tenants 

 that for every £i spent in rent, from 15s. to £1 is spent on 

 other expenses connected with the undertaking." * But all 

 these are, to the unbiased mind, so obvious that we will pass 

 on to a consideration of the actual habits of the birds themselves. 



The three commonest game-birds in this country are the 

 pheasant, the red grouse, and the partridge, in addition to 

 which we have the woodcock, capercaillie, quail, ptarmigan, 

 and snipe. It is with reference to the first three species that 

 the charges of damage are chiefly levelled, and particularly 

 against the pheasant. 



Careful examinations of the crops and stomach contents of 

 a large series of adult and young birds, obtained from various 

 parts of the country during the past six years, examination of 

 and experimentation with the faeces, experiments on captive 

 birds, and numerous field investigations, form the basis upon 

 which the above-mentioned charges will be shown to be largely 

 fictitious. It is not possible here to give detailed schedules of 

 the food contents of the stomachs and crops of the individual 

 specimens examined, but the summaries and figures at once 

 indicate the results obtained. 



The Pheasant 



The pheasant is essentially an inhabitant of woods. Yarrell * 

 writes : " Woods that are thick at the bottom, with long grass 

 kept up by brambles and bushes, thick plantations, or marshy 

 islands and moist grounds overgrown with rushes, reeds, or 

 osiers are the favourite resorts of pheasants, in default of which 

 they take to thick hedgerows, but can seldom be induced to 

 remain long on any ground bare of shelter, however undis- 

 turbed. Wood and water are indispensable." 



Considerable diversity of opinion exists as to whether the 

 pheasant digs with its beak or scratches for its food, like the 

 common fowl. Our experience is that it behaves very much 

 like the fowl, first scratching away any surface material, and 



1 Lord Lovat in Introduction in The Grouse in Health and Disease. 



2 Hist. Brit. Birds, 1884, vol. iii. p. 98. 



