CAUSES OF MORTALITY IN THE RED GROUSE 127 



A cock Grouse of 21 ounces was " watched for ten days " 

 in March 1908. During that time he was flushed regularly 

 every day by the gamekeeper at the same place. But during 

 the last few days he could not be flushed " without the help of 

 a dog as he was becoming every day the weaker " ; so he was 

 shot, and forwarded as a case of " Grouse Disease." This he 

 was, but only to a very slight extent. The real reason why 

 he objected to being flushed regularly every day was because 

 he had retired to a certain retreat to be away from other birds 

 and remain quiet while a wire-fence wound healed. It was 

 found that the wire had torn through the skin of his breast, 

 and had rent the pectoral muscles, which are the muscles of 

 flight. Had he been left alone he would have recovered in a 

 few weeks, and would have rejoined the healthy birds on the 

 higher ground as soon as he was fit to hold his own. This 

 retirement of a sick or damaged Grouse to a place where he can 

 recruit his health in solitude is in accordance with the habit of 

 almost every animal that lives. 



Damage to the crop is sometimes responsible for accidental Damage to 

 death or injury. crop< 



A cock Grouse of 21 ounces was caught and killed, July 

 1908, in Argyllshire. There was very great dilatation of the 

 crop, which was filled with an old blood-clot and with heather, 

 the crop contents had been there for a long while, and had 

 become dry and mildewed. There were two or three cicatrised 

 wounds through the skin and crop ; but these were all closed 

 except one, which remained open and suppurating. The passage 

 to the oesophagus downward was free, and the bird might 

 possibly have recovered in time. The crop was adherent every- 

 where to the subcutaneous tissues, and so to the skin, and 

 there were numerous enlarged blood-vessels wandering over the 

 crop wall and also in the adhesions caused by the diffuse 

 inflammation. It is extraordinary that the bird should have 

 maintained its weight so well 21 ounces ; Davainea was absent, 

 Hymenolepis and Trichostrongylus were both present, but with 

 no redness in any part of the gut. 



