66 PHEASANTS FOB COVERTS AND AVIARIES. 



obserred that where pheasants were preserved near a rookery, 

 pheasants were to be seen there through March, April, and 

 May. I did not observe the real cause of their foraging and 

 running about the rookeries till about 1844, when I saw a 

 cock pheasant pick up a piece of potato on a gravel walk, and 

 run away with it into the shrubbery, and remembered that I 

 had often seen pieces of potato lying about, and had seen the 

 rooks drop them and their pellets likewise. The latter were 

 frequently full of half-digested grains, as if dropped through 

 fright. I had seen from the middle of February to the middle 

 of May bushels of pellets underneath the trees scratched over 

 by the pheasants — of course for the food to be found therein ; 

 and there were always pheasants' nests close at hand, eveu in 

 or under the rookery. Where the potato is much cultivated, 

 as in South Devon, a good many small potatoes would be 

 turned up in ploughing the land, which the rook and jackdaw 

 seemed to claim as their perquisites and carry off home. I have 

 seen five or six fall of a morning on walking under the trees, 

 but the birds never came down to pick one up. I have seen 

 fall large brown grubs, the fern beetle, whole ears and loose 

 grains of corn, pellets or quids half chewed or sucked over, 

 and have seen the pheasants run and pick them up. There 

 IS fine living in variety for pheasants under a rookery, pro- 

 vided neither party is disturbed by strangers. Respecting 

 the rooks' pellets, from the middle of February to the middle 

 of March, in a corn-growing district, while the spring corn is 

 sowing the rook hurries over the new-^own land, and picks up 

 all stray grains that comes under his observation, as well as 

 worms, grubs, slugs, bits of potatoes, pieces of half-decayed 

 scales of oyster shells, little pieces of lime, sand, and gravel- 

 all together hoarded under the lower mandible, which looks 

 like a big full pouch as he arrives home to his mate in charge 

 of the nest. Here his load is delivered to the mate, who, with 

 great ado, chews it over, and ejects the pellet or quid in due 

 course. This business is continued till late at night. Many 

 times, passing under the trees at various hours, from 10 p.m. 



