NATURAL HISTORY NOTES 63 



Seeds. All grains ; seeds of birch and alder ; 

 also of many grasses, sedges, polygonums, hemp- 

 nettle, cornspurrey, cow-wheat, and other weeds ; 

 the keys of ash and sycamore ; the spangles so 

 common on under side of oak leaves in autumn, 

 containing dormant eggs of a gadfly {Neuroterus 

 lentkidaris) ; new sprouting barley, and practically 

 every (distinctively not comprehensively) seed that 

 the farmer sows. 



Berries and Fruits. Wild - strawberries, 

 currants, raspberries, blackberries, elderberries, 

 misletoe, hawthorn ; the berries of holly, yew 

 and of many shrubs in cultivation (see chapter 

 on game-coverts); hips of the wild-rose, and in 

 the garden, apples, pears, plums, cherries, and 

 mulberries. 



Nuts. Beech-mast, acorns of oak and ilex, 

 hazel-nuts, sweet chestnuts. 



It is curious to read in a traveller's 

 notes of sixty years ago, that the staple 

 food of a wild race of common pheasants 

 at the mouth of the river Drin in Albania, 

 consisted of maize, a diet more commonly 

 associated by us with the rearing -field. 

 While the above list includes most of 

 what the pheasant lives on in general, 

 he is on occasion capable of amazing 

 gastronomic feats, and his capabilities 



