320 A SPRING AND SUMMER IN LAPLAND. 



head, back, and chest, the belly and under part 

 pure white. The black colour darkest on the 

 breast. 



The change from the winter to the summer 

 dress is clearly a true moult, and not a change of 

 colour in the feathers. It is most difficult to say 

 what is the real summer dress of the ptarmigan, 

 for they appear to be in a continual state of change 

 or moult during the whole summer, and bear no 

 one dress for any length of time ; and so irregular 

 is the moult or change, that you scarcely ever see 

 two exactly alike or in the same state of forward- 

 ness, for in the same day in the end of July you 

 may kill some in the early summer dress, and 

 others with many blue autumn feathers. Up to 

 July 9 I observed that all the old males which I 

 killed were dark brownish-black on the back, 

 speckled with lighter brown, especially on the head, 

 breast, and sides ; belly pure white, but the dark 

 breast is much more conspicuous in some than in 

 others. By July 20 the whole body colour had 

 become much lighter, and by the end of July was 

 evidently changing to blue-grey, but still speckled 

 with brown, especially on the head. By the 6th 

 of August the majority of the males had assumed 

 a totally different dress — head still speckled with 

 yellowish-brown, back bluish- grey, watered with 

 black and white ; belly pure white ; and this was 



