450 On Hybrids produced in a Wild State 



where the hornbeam is abundant.* In this vicinity it seems rapidly 

 increasing, and will probably ere long be equally common with its 

 ally the Greenfinch. 



VII On Hybrids produced in a Wild Slate between the Black- 

 Grouse {Telrao tetrix,) and Common Pheasant {Phasianus Col- 

 chicus.) By William Thompson, Esq. Vice-President of the 

 Belfast Natural History Society.t 



Having lately heard that a hybrid bird, bred between the com- 

 mon pheasant (Phasianus Colchiciis, Linn.) and black grouse (Te- 

 trao tetrix, Linn.) had been shot in Wigtonshire, and was preserved 

 for Sir Andrew Agnew, Bart., M. P., through the medium of our 

 mutual friend, Captain Foyrer, R. N., I proposed a few queries 

 respecting it. Sir Andrew, on receiving these, thought an examina- 

 tion of the specimen would prove more satisfactory than a mere 

 reply, and, with the kindest consideration, sent the bird from Loch- 

 naw Castle for my inspection. He states that it was shot in the 

 autumn of 1835 in a wild state at Lochnaw, where it had been seen 

 several times on the wing by persons who imagined it to be a wild 

 turkey. Pheasants and black grouse are numerous in the surround- 

 ing plantations ; but this is the only bird of the kind that has been 

 observed. 



In four instances only am I aware of similar hybrids being re- 

 corded. The first is mentioned in White's History of Selborne as a 

 curious bird, shot in a coppice at the Holt, and sent by Lord Stawell 

 for his inspection. Its parentage was not rightly conjectured by Mr 

 White, nor even by several later authors who have endeavoured from 

 his description to make it out. In a note, however, to p. 344 of a late 

 edition of this work (8vo ed. 1833), the Hon. and Rev. William 

 Herbert mentions having seen the specimen in the collection of the 

 Earl of Egremontat Petworth, and speaks decisively to its true parent- 

 age. The second specimen was exhibited at a meeting of the Zoo- 

 logical Society of London on the 24th of June 1834, by Joseph 

 Sabine, Esq. who stated that it was bred in Cornwall.^ The third, 

 shot near Merrington, in Shropshire, was announced to the same 

 Society on the 12th of May 1835, by T. Q. Eyton, Esq. by whom 

 it was described in some detail. § In the preface to a subsequent 



* This is not the case, nor is it a natural consequence to the abundance of the 

 Hornbeam. 



f Read before this Society on Dec. 7, 1836, when the specimen from the 

 collection of Sir A. Agnew, Bart, was exhibited. 



| Proc. Zool. Soc 1834, p. 52. § Ibid. 1835, p. 62. 



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