NATURAL HISTORY NOTES 59 



more assured quantity than is the case 

 with partridges. In favourable seasons 

 partridges certainly increase to numbers 

 far beyond anything ever known among 

 pheasants, but it is equally true that in 

 bad seasons their numbers dwindle away 

 to less than could be counted courting 

 about the fields in spring, and reference 

 to the pages of any country house game- 

 book in a district where the conditions 

 are equally favourable to both game-birds 

 will generally show that while the total 

 number of pheasants killed annually keep 

 within a few hundreds of the average, the 

 partridges will vary by thousands from 

 year to year. 



And the reason for this apparent 

 anomaly is simple, for the nesting opera- 

 tions of the pheasants are spread over a 

 longer period, and so the young birds 

 are not subject in the same way to 

 the wholesale catastrophe that so often 

 sweeps away the rising generation of 

 partridges in a few hours. Two such 

 catastrophes, involving no more upheaval 



