22 THE GROUSE IN HEALTH AND IN DISEASE 



have even been known to eat the old unburnt stick heather which on all other 

 occasions they reject as unfit for food ; but this is probably the last resource of 

 the famine-stricken stock, and hardly justifies the practice of leaving a large 

 amount of this unwholesome old heather as a food reserve in time of snow, 

 for such a practice must greatly reduce the available supply of food at the 

 critical period of early spring. A better practice is undoubtedly to burn all the 

 more exposed ridges and knolls with careful discrimination, so that in whichever 

 •direction the snow may drift there is a good chance that some good feeding 

 heather will be left bare. 



It might be thought that where a heavy snowstorm occurs during the night 

 there would be a risk of whole packs of Grouse being covered up and smothered 

 by the drifts as the birds were jugging in a sheltered hollow. Sheep are often 

 lost in large numbers by such misadventure, but Grouse never, for as they 

 jug in the lee of a peat-hag or a moorland dyke they tread the snow under 

 them as it falls, and are found next morning safely collected on the surface, 

 though their fresh droppings several feet below show the level at which they 

 began their night's repose. 



It has been said that Grouse often avail themselves of the shelter of woods 

 and plantations in time of snow; but the evidence on the subject is most 

 •contradictory. In some districts it has been found beneficial to plant trees as 

 a shelter for Grouse ; in other districts, especially in the north of Scotland, they 

 never use woods for shelter. 



It is generally believed that a hard winter with much snow is beneficial to 

 the health of the stock in the following spring, and the reason commonly given is 

 that the hard weather kills oti" the weaklings. There is no evidence to support 

 this theory. Grouse are seldom found dead during the winter months, and when 

 they are the cause can never be ascribed directly to the efiects of weather. If the 

 belief that snow is beneficial is well founded, some other reason must be sought ; 

 perhaps the fact that the weather has caused the stock to shift, and so introduced 

 new blood where required, may have something to do with the improvement : 

 more likely, however, the solution is found to be connected with the question 

 of food supply. Ground which has been covered by snow for a period of several 

 months provides better and more wholesome food than ground which has been 

 heavily stocked, for when birds return in the spring they find the food supply 

 still untouched by Grouse or Sheep, and the fact that it has been out of reach 

 for so long has prevented it from being so heavily infected by the larvaj 



