CHAPTER I 



NATURE OF THE DISEASE 



The epidemic disease which affects Red Grouse 

 (Lagoptcs scoticMs) in Scotland, the North of England, 

 Wales, and Ireland during the spring and the summer, ^ 

 and which, particularly during April, May, and June 

 of some years, makes such sad havoc amongst them, 

 is the one which goes under the name of the Grouse 

 Disease. Not that grouse and allied species are 

 exempt from other affections, but the disease which 

 for years past, in one or another part of the north 

 of the British Isles, has carried away annually large 

 numbers of these birds, is the one known as the 

 "Grouse Disease." Nor do we mean that this 

 disease occurs amongst the red grouse in spring and 

 summer-time only, for there is good evidence to show 

 that though these are the seasons in which the plague, 

 when occurring, is most conspicuous owing to its 

 extensive mortality, the autumn and winter are not free 



