6010 



Birds. 



an intelligent and trustworthy person in this parish. — J. H»Gurney ; Catton, Norfolk, 

 Fehruanj 23, 1858. 



Contributions towards a Biography of the Partridge. 

 By the Rev. J. C. Atkinson, M.A. 



(Continued from page 5985). 



I HAVE often heard it alleged that the partridge suffers much in 

 long-continued severe weather, and that in many instances they suc- 

 cumb altogether. It may be so ; but I must say I have never yet 

 met with any decided instance of much apparent injury, from cold or 

 hunger, to a partridge, in the very hardest weather I have ever known. 

 We have had two or three winters, within the last half a dozen years, 

 in which, from the depth of snow and the continuance of the frost, I 

 confess I expected to meet with proofs of its power upon these birds ; 

 but with an almost solitary exception of a bird that had been 

 wounded and had not recovered from the effects of its hurt, I cannot 

 say my anticipations were ever fulfilled. On the contrary, the birds 

 I have killed when snow had laid on the ground three or four weeks 

 were as plump and fat as they have been this winter, when the ground 

 has hardly once been fairly covered. Their chief food in seasons of 

 severity seems to be obtained at the bottom of hedges with a south 

 aspect, especially where there is a little oozing of water from want of 

 drainage ; indeed at any place which by the same means — the sun's 

 rays or springing water — is kept open or cleared of snow. The grass 

 that is found in such places is eaten closely off, and no doubt any in- 

 sects or larva? inhabiting there are eagerly picked up. Again, I have 

 seen them continually, at such times, about the edges of a running 

 stream; sometimes at the water's edge; more generally under the 

 snow drifts on the bank, especially where the bank faced the sun. A 

 place abounding with tufts of rushes, and of course therefore with 

 more or less of moisture both above and below, is much frequented by 

 them in severe weather; and there are many places in my beat where, 

 from their answering the description now given, I could at any time, 

 in continued snow and frost, find partridges day after day. That in 

 extreme cases they may suffer extensively may be quite true, but I 

 am convinced, from my own observation here (and a reference to my 

 thermomctrical and other weather records, carefully kept, shows how 



