RED GROUSE 223 



shire ; and also that 220 brace had been killed to one gun over 

 dogs at Grandtully, in Perthshire, in a single day, as had a 

 similar bag a couple of decades before by Colonel Campbell of 

 Monzie. Only once since has as large a bag been made by one 

 gun in the day, and that was twenty years ago. Now Scotch 

 moors do not equal the season's bags recorded above, nor do 

 men make as big single gun-bags over dogs. Only once in 

 1905, and again in 1906, have a pair of guns shooting together 

 equalled 100 brace in the day. 



Another question arises here naturally. It is : Are the birds 

 wilder than they were thirty-five years ago, and does driving at 

 the end of the season make them wilder for the next season ? 

 No doubt it makes the old cocks wilder, but the grouse hen is 

 only just as wild as her brood always. Even in Yorkshire, 

 before the brood can fly the grouse hen lies to be trodden up ; 

 she grows wild exactly in proportion to the wildness of her 

 chicks, and if we are to believe the biologists, acquired character 

 is not transmitted to offspring. The author believes that the 

 principal necessity in all grouse preservation is to kill a large 

 proportion of the old cocks whether they have had broods or 

 not, and consequently where wildnesss makes them secure 

 they should not be made wild by end of the season driving, 

 either with or without a preliminary of dog work. Had the 

 author the planning and management of Highland moors now 

 as he had years ago, he would get rid of these already-made- 

 wild old cocks by driving each beat the day before dogging it, 

 but with drivers just so far apart as appeared to be necessary 

 to make sure of moving the old cocks but not the broods, 

 which in any case will not drive well as early as the first week 

 of shooting. The clearance of the objectionable brigade, which 

 if left alone the first bad weather will send to the " tops," is as 

 necessary for a driving moor as for a dog moor, and as it is for one 

 which has previously been both. The greater market value of 

 the dog moors in the Highlands over the driving moors in England 

 (grouse for grouse) makes it necessary to find a way to negative 

 the damage done by making the old cocks wild. But the 

 writer is not sure that the manner of going up to dogs is not 



