CAUSES OF MORTALITY IN THE RED GROUSE 151 



deaths are directly or indirectly due to accident or to artificial causes. Many 

 of these causes may be traced to the agency of man, and it will be 

 shown elsewhere to how great an extent some of them are avoidable causes of 

 by attention to the details of moor management. 



Shooting, in all its forms, is responsible for a great deal of unrecorded 

 damage amongst Grouse ; and the examples of " pricked '' birds which have 

 come to the Committee's notice, generally sent as "diseased" birds for 

 examination, show amongst other . things how extraordinarily active is the 

 recuperative power of an animal in a state of nature. Bones are fractured 

 and reunited, even those of the wing, allowing the bird to survive, to be shot 

 again the following year. 



Peritoneal adhesions may shut off a perforation of the intestine, and even 

 result in a short-circuit of the gut before leakage has caused sufficient general 

 peritonitis to result in death. 



Chapter viii. deals with the mortality and damage due to accidental causes, 

 or to natural causes other than true " Grouse Disease," and thus clears the way 

 for the proper consideration of the main subject of the investigation, viz., death 

 due to " Grouse Disease." 



