RED GROUSE. 
6 
of Pheasants and Partridges from the vicinity of the coops, I repeatedly remarked that, while breeding on 
the moors in the north, the food brought to their offspring consisted for the most part of rats and mice, 
with now and then a few small birds, Pipits being the chief sufferers. Not a single member of the Crow 
family can resist the temptation to make a meal off an exposed egg, the Grey Crow being without doubt 
the most mischievous of this troublesome crew. Ravens usually hunt at higher elevations on the hills 
than the rest of the family, and Ptarmigan suffer considerably, their nests being frequently sought out 
and plundered by these sturdy rascals. Jackdaws are well known as inveterate thieves ; I noticed the 
empty shells of hundreds of Grouse eggs scattered over the ledges of rock on which a colony were 
breeding in the face of a cliff in the west of Perthshire. In dry neather, when food is scarce, Rooks are 
especially addicted to hunting over the lower portions of the hill-sides, and may frequently he seen with 
an egg in their beaks. Both the Greater and Lesser Black-hacked Gulls breed on the moors in 
several counties, and levy a heavy tax on their less powerful neighbours, any eggs or young falling in 
their way being gulped down with the utmost avidity. I once detected a Common Gull in the act of 
devouring a downy nestling of the Golden Plover ; it is, however, doubtless on small fish, captured in 
the shallows of the rivers, that this species chiefly subsists. Judging by the castings observed scattered 
over the moss-grown mounds on the fiat moors of Caithness from which parties of Arctic Skuas 
had been seen to rise, it is possible that they possess a taste for eggs. It is, however, but fair to state 
that I never met with an opportunity of watching them in the act of committing a robbery of this 
description ; and there is of course a chance that Hooded Crows might have been the real culprits, 
none of the specimens of S. i:>arasiticus I shot on the moors, near their breeding-quarters, containing any 
other food than smolts. An inspection of the supply of prey collected in the larder of a mountain-fox 
will at once reveal the fact that game of all descriptions must suffer to a largo extent from the rapacity 
of these marauders. On returning to my shooting-quarters in Glenlyon in May 18G6, I learned from 
the head keeper that the foxhunter* had recently been over the greater part of the ground with his 
dogs, hut had utterly failed in detecting signs of the object of his search. Being well aware that the 
vixen not unfrequently conveys her cubs long distances on signs of danger, removing them to some deu 
among the rocks, which is unknown or inaccessible to her pursuers, and again transporting them from 
place to place, I was anxious to ascertain if it was possible that the whole of the old badger- and fox-cairns 
on our beats had been deserted. In order to make a thorough exploration of the earths near the summit of 
a low range of hills to the south of the Lyon, an early start was decided upon, and after driving some 
miles on our way the conveyance was left before the rays of the sun had struck down into the glen. An 
ascent of but a few hundred yards had been made, when feathers scattered about among the heather 
attracted attention, and on examining the spot it was at once apj)arent that a hen Grouse had been 
seized on her nest. The track over which the bird had been dragged was by no means difficult to follow, 
and after taking the line for a couple of hundred yards I was convinced that it led to the upper cairn, and 
accordingly made straight for the hill-top. Erom the widely spread traces of feathers and down scattered 
among the roots of the heather, the bird had probably been carried off alive, the down and feathers having 
been dispersed by an occasional fiap. On reaching the opening to the den it was at once evident from 
the frantic excitement exhibited by our small pack of rough-coated terriers that some, at least, of their 
foes were at home. Having blocked another entrance from the opposite side of the ridge, we proceeded 
to dig down towards the habitable portion of the cairn ; ascertaining, however, that the cubs were alone 
we desisted, and set to work to construct shelters in which the keeper and a gillie might remain to 
await the arrival of the vixen at dusk, at which hour she would in all prohahility return with fresh- 
• In order to protect their flocks, the sheep-farmers in a few remote localities of the Highlands still employ a fozhuntor. who makes periodical 
visits to the glens in his district, attended by a small pack of nondescript hounds and terriers. 
