CAPERCAILLIE 



51 



from some other frightful malady, worse than gunshot 

 wounds or the little white abscesses which are noticeable 

 in the ovaries of those commonly known as " mule " birds. 

 The two birds depicted on page 35 are from my own 

 collection ; the upper figure shows a specimen with the 

 plumage of the male just commencing, which was killed 

 November 1885 within a few miles of Perth. The other 

 bird has almost completely changed, with the exception 

 of one or two red feathers in the breast, and where in the 



TAILS OF CAPERCAILLIE, GREYHEN, AND HYBRID BETWEEN THE TWO. 



cock the shield on the breast and crop is usually metallic 

 green, in this specimen it is of a deep purple : it would 

 be difficult at first to distinguish it from a young cock, 

 were it not for the absence of wattles and its diminutive 

 size, which is smaller than the ordinary hen. This bird 

 was also shot near Perth, December 1883. Colonel 

 Colquhoun has one nearly as dark, and I have another 

 with still a little more brown and russet intermixed. 



The only other species with which this interbreeds is 

 Blackgame the hybrids being the product of the Black- 



