THE BLACK GROUSE 117 



Wales. From many of these they have now entirely 

 disappeared. In Ireland, where repeated efforts have 

 been made to effect their establishment, black game, for 

 all principal sporting purposes, are non-existent. Scot- 

 land is now the true home of black grouse in Great 

 Britain. But even in this their principal stronghold 

 these birds were some few years ago reported as de- 

 creasing in numbers. The causes assigned as being 

 contributory to this decrease were a succession of 

 abnormally wet hatching seasons, the method of drain- 

 ing land by means of open surface drains the drains 

 causing the death of many chicks and the loss caused 

 by rooks and carrion-crows in the way of egg-stealing 

 and the killing of newly-hatched young. Happily this 

 decadence of the species in Scotland now seems to have 

 been in some degree arrested, at all events temporarily, 

 by the return to more favourable climatic conditions, 

 better reports of the shooting having come to hand 

 recently. 



Within recent years several attempts have been made 

 towards the inclusion of black game in the list of Irish 

 sporting birds. Efforts to introduce these birds into 

 Antrim and also into Sligo have proved unsuccessful, 

 notwithstanding the fact that ground suited to their 

 requirements was selected. In this connection it is 

 interesting to observe that no evidence has as yet been 

 forthcoming to show that black game ever were indigenous 

 in Ireland. Still, herein is probably not the true reason 

 for this want of success, for on the extensive heathy 

 tracts along part of the north-west border of Norfolk, 

 where it was considered that at one time black game 

 were truly indigenous, similar attempts towards the 

 introduction of the species have proved equally futile. 



