68 TETRAONID.E. • 



with species which, hke the Red Grouse, pair in their 

 season, than with those Avhich, like the Pheasant and the 

 CapercailKe, do not pair. MacgiUivray (British Birds, i. 162) 

 has, however, mentioned three, describing in detail one 

 bird supposed to have been thus produced, and which 

 was sent by Lord Mostyn from Wales, for preservation, 

 on the 8th of September, 1855, when a note was made 

 of its appearance. The head, neck, breast, and all the 

 under surface of the body, resembled the plumage of the 

 young Bed Grouse ; the back, wings, upper tail-coverts, and 

 the tail-feathers, were as black as those parts in the Black 

 Grouse ; the tail-feathers were elongated and forked, but 

 being a young bird of the year, and killed thus early in the 

 season, the most lateral of the tail-feathers had not begun 

 to curve outwards ; the legs were feathered to the junction of 

 the toes, but the toes were naked and pectinated, like those 

 of the Black Grouse. Another was recorded in ' The Field ' 

 of March 15th, 1863, and a very handsome example, more 

 like the Black-cock about the upper parts, was obtained by 

 Mr. H. E. Dresser in Leadenhall Market, the 12th October, 

 1876. 



In Scandinavia the Black Grouse occasionally mates with 

 the Dal-Eipa or Willow-Grouse (Lagopus alhus), the repre- 

 sentative there of our Scotch Grouse ; the offspring being 

 known as " Bypeorre " or " Riporre." A representation of one 

 of these hybrids is given on the opposite page from Nilsson's 

 ' Skandinavisk Fauna.'* A far rarer hybrid is the one between 

 the Black and the Hazel Grouse {Bonasa hetulina) described 

 and exhibited by Mr. Dresser (P. Z. S., 1876, p. 345). 



In this country the hybrids best known are those 

 between the Black Grouse and the Pheasant. The 



* Mr. Collett of Christiania maintains, in opposition to some other naturalists, 

 tbat this hybrid is the result of a union between the male of Lagopus alhus and 

 the female of Tetrao letrix ; and his arguments are given at great length in his 

 ' Remarks on the Ornithology of Northern Norway,' published in the ' For band - 

 linger Videnskabs-Selskabet i Christiania,' 1873, pp. 238-251, and partly repro- 

 duced in Mr. Dresser's 'Birds of Europe,' vii. pp. 213-216. The reader 

 should bear in mind that whenever Mr. Collett uses our word * Ptarmigan ' 

 in the above pages, he refers to the Willow-Qrou.se, and not to Lar/opus mutus. 



