154 Northern Observations of Inland Birds 



quently the partridge, once almost as plentiful in the 

 lower levels as the grouse was on the heights above, 

 slowly migrated towards the low country, till almost 

 throughout the Highlands it became a rare bird. Recent 

 years have seen a compulsory increase in the amount of 

 cultivated land in the hills, and it is already very noticeable 

 in many parts of the Highlands that the partridges are 

 returning. During the last two or three years, indeed, I 

 have located breeding couples in small glens where, 

 before the war, their presence was almost or entirely 

 unknown. 



Like most sociable ground birds, partridges are es- 

 sentially birds of routine habits, and where they are not 

 disturbed by sportsmen, they are found day after day 

 visiting the same places at regular hours — prompt in 

 their coming and going almost to the minute. I used 

 daily to see a covey alight on a patch of w^aste land near 

 my house shortly after four o'clock, and having remained 

 there twenty minutes or so they would follow their leader 

 through a certain gap in the wall, and make their way 

 towards their roosting place. This covey, as is generally 

 the case, roosted night after night in the centre of the 

 same field — a habit to which the poacher is much alive. 

 It is a comparatively easy matter to net roosting part- 

 ridges on having marked them down, and where they 

 are preserved it is customary for keepers to stick black- 

 thorn branches into the ground about the fields the birds 

 frequent, as these foul the nets and thus hinder the work 

 of the poacher. 



Partridges, however, exercise considerable discretion 

 as regards their roosting habits. As a rule they gather 

 well towards the centre of the field, and the larger the 

 field the better they like it. Thus the danger of surprise 

 attack is very much reduced, but to reduce it still further 

 the birds do not roost all in a bunch, as some authorities 



