The Game Birds. 115 



branches of bushes or trees which may tempt them up to 

 dangerous heights; and onljMeave such bushes and lower trees 

 as are safe, accessible to them. I once had a Capercaillie cock 

 killed owing to a stranger passing under his tree and causing 

 him to fly oft his perch after dusk. My Capercaillie hens 

 generally made their nests, as they so often do in the wild state, 

 against the bole of a tree. They cover their eggs, and so cleverly 

 do they conceal the nest that once a Capercaillie hen, by scraping 

 out a hollow, managed to prevent us from finding her nest on 

 perfectly bare ground under a beech tree, till one day we un- 

 expectedly found her incubating. 



Keepers sometimes advance a theory that grey hens do not 

 lay till the third summer after they are hatched. Long ago I 

 had clear evidence that this is not correct in regard to Caper- 

 caillies, and it seemed unlikely that their smaller relatives would 

 be slower to attain maturity. But since I have kept Blackgame 

 I found that they too will breed in their second summer. I 

 believe the reason why so considerable a proportion of grey hens 

 is sometimes seen without young is that, while the birds seeks 

 damp rushy places to nest in, the chicks are exceptionally 

 delicate, and their survival greatly depends upon the sort of 

 weather which they have to face during the first week or two 

 of their lives. 



Redgrouse have been often kept in a half-tame condition, 

 and more than once in recent years they have been bred in 

 confinement. This has always I think been achieved in places 

 where a supply of heather was available to augment their food. 

 Bttt I have no heather within reach, and my Grouse had to be 

 content with meal, green stuff and bird seed (Canary and hemp), 

 with such grass and clover as they found in 'their enclosure. I 

 had a hen Grouse for over three years, which during that time 

 never saw heather. Her habits of course altered considerably 

 under such artificial conditions. She would, in wet weather, 

 roost on a lower branch of a box tree, and I have seen her 

 busily breaking up and eating an acorn. 



Grouse are charming pets, and the cocks become almost 

 troublesomely bold and aggressive. A full-winged tame cock 

 Grouse that I used to know on Spey-side would fly in the face of 

 any stranger in the spring-time. 



