BLACKGAME. 93 



and nearly all observations should be made and read in a 

 general sense. Thus, we sometimes obtain excellent sport 

 by driving the woods and gills the morning after a storm. 

 But on other days, under what appear precisely similar cir- 

 cumstances, hardly a bird has been found in the shelter. 



Not always, however, do the birds and the hill-farmers 

 enjoy the luxury of a mild winter. Often the " genuine 

 article " is ushered in in November, and storm follows storm 

 till the brown heather disappears entirely beneath the 

 universal covering of dazzling snow. Under these con- 

 ditions, the Blackgame (though many of them still cling to 

 their chosen hillocks above with surprising tenacity) are 

 generally to be found congregated in the wooded valleys 

 below, where dozens of them may be seen perched like 

 Kooks on the bare birches and hawthorns. Here they feed 

 chiefly on haws, and on the budding shoots or "tops" of 

 birch and alder. They also get a certain amount of heather 

 in places where the wind has drifted the snow from the 

 weather-slopes of the hills, or where sheep have been 

 feeding. Blackgame stand prolonged snow-storms with 

 great hardiness, and show little or no falling off in con- 

 dition ; but in the snow-storms of December 1882, a friend 

 tells me he found many Grey-hens dead and dying on his 

 farm, even in the stackyards. The crops of nearly all these 

 birds were quite full, and death was ascribed to their 

 inability to obtain the necessary supplies of sand, gravel, 

 &c., required to promote digestion. 



A question has been raised as to whether Grey-hens breed 

 in their first spring, and I have even heard it stated that 

 they do not breed till their third year. This, of course, is a 

 matter very difficult, or even incapable, of direct proof; but 

 so precarious are the lives of game-birds that, if handicapped 

 so severely, I imagine they could hardly manage long to 

 maintain the " struggle for existence." My own observation 

 leads me unhesitatingly to say that Grey-hens do breed in 

 their first year, or at least as many of them as have the 

 opportunity. The number of Grey-hens without broods 

 never appears greater than can be accounted for by the fact 

 of the species being polygamous. 



