PRELIMINARY CLASSIFIED NOTES 3 



Average size of 60 eggs, 2-27 x 1-62 in. [57'8 x 41 '3 mm.]. Incubation is performed 

 by the hen alone, and lasts about a month (Saunders). Mr. W. Evans states that 

 13 eggs hatched under hens on the 26th day. Laying begins towards the end 

 of April in Scotland, and full clutches may be found from the second week of 

 May onward, sometimes as late as early June, but only a single brood is reared in 

 the season. [F. c. R. J.] 



5. Food. In spring the buds of various trees ; in summer and autumn, ant 

 larvae and other insects, wild fruits and berries, acorns and grain ; in winter, the 

 shoots of Scotch fir and larch. The young feed on worms, ants' eggs, and insects, 

 and are accompanied in their search by the female, [w. P. P.] 



BLACK-GROUSE [Lyrurus tetrix (Linnaeus) ; Tetrdo tetrix Linnaeus. 

 Blackcock ( $ ), grey-hen ( $ ), blackgame, heathcock ; heathpoult (Devon). 

 French, coq de bruyere ; German, Birkhahn ( $ ), BirJchuhn ( $ ) ; Italian, 

 fagiano di monte]. 



I . Description. The blackcock may be distinguished at once by the peculiar 

 lyre-shaped tail. The toes are scale-covered, and fringed on either side by a pectin- 

 ate arrangement of horny processes. The sexes differ conspicuously in coloration, 

 and the male shows an imperfect "eclipse" plumage. (PI. 137.) Length 23 -5 in. 

 [585-46 mm.]. The plumage of the male is black, with a beautiful metallic sheen 

 of steel blue. A bar of white crosses the whig, and the under tail-coverts are white. 

 Above the eye is a large " wattle " of vermilion-red. The beak is black and the iris 

 dark brown. The female (grey-hen) is distinguished from the capercaillie female by her 

 deeply forked tail and smaller size. The general coloration is of a rufous buff, more or 

 less heavily barred with black. In the male in " eclipse " dress (July-September) the 

 black feathers on the head, and more or fewer of those of the upper back, are replaced 

 by chestnut or brownish buff feathers barred with black, resembling those of the 

 female, while the chin and throat are more or less white. These dull-coloured feathers 

 are all that survive of a once complete " eclipse " dress. They are retained until 

 the quills of the whig and tail have been renewed. The female may at once 

 be distinguished from the female capercaillie by her deeply forked tail. Further, 

 she is less conspicuously barred, the bars being much narrower. On the back, 

 as in the capercaillie female, black predominates, reducing the buff area to a 

 narrow-terminal band in each feather. The upper surface of the fork of the tail, 

 when closed, has a " frosted " appearance. The juvenile plumage recalls that of the 



