THE ZOOLOGIST 



No. 889.— July 15th, 1915. 



NOTES ON THE BREEDING HABITS OF THE 

 WILLOV/-GROUSE (LAGOPUS LAGOPUS) AT THE 

 MOUTH OF THE YENESEI RIVER, SIBERIA. 



By M. D. Haviland. 



(Plate II.) 



During the summer of 1914, as one of the party of Miss 

 Czaplicka of Oxford, I visited Golchika, the most northerly 

 village of the Yenesei River. The bird-life of the district has 

 many features of great interest to ornithologists, although in 

 that latitude (72°) there was little that was typically Asiatic in 

 the avifauna. Out of the thirty- seven species of birds that I 

 observed there, all but one were represented on the British lists 

 (though in one or two cases by a different subspecies). The 

 only bird not so represented was the Willow-Grouse (Lagopus 

 lag opus),* the subject of these notes. 



The Willow-Grouse (the "balshaya Kuropatka" or "big 

 partridge " of the Siberians) was frequent on the tundras of the 

 Yenesei estuary, though nowhere very abundant. It was 

 generally to be found in the more marshy spots where a trickle 

 of water ran down a gulley and spread into a small swamp 

 which was covered with knee-deep willow scrub. Early in the 

 season when the snow is melting, I imagine that the birds feed 

 largely on the buds of the willow. The crop of a male shot in 

 such a place on July 12th was stuffed full of them. I never saw 



* B. 0. U. list. 

 Zool. 4th ser. vol. XIX., July, 1915. u 



