having stirred perhaps for hours the dogs may come within a yard or two before winding them."[1]
In the early part of the day and at dusk Grouse are found looking for grit, on the rough moor roads and tracks, or along the burn-sides, where every fresh spate washes down a new supply.
The attraction presented to the Grouse by a suitable supply of grit is most marked. Good grit is to the Grouse what raisins are to Pheasants, and salt to Grit Deer. They often fly long distances to obtain it, and in districts where it is scarce they will congregate in numbers along the railways and roads that traverse the moor, in order to avail themselves of the supply thus artificially introduced.
Towards midday Grouse are generally found on the "tops" and higher grounds, and especially amongst broken moss-hags; or, if the weather is very hot, they may be flushed from the burn-sides and shaded places; in very rough weather they do not scorn the shelter afforded by a ledge of rock or bank of peat, and may then be best approached down wind. The best shooting is often got late in the afternoon on the low ground, to which the Grouse have descended to feed before "jugging," with crops crammed with heather shoots.
When moving from one part of a moor to another Grouse usually fly low, and as their principal time for shifting their ground is in the early morning or at dusk they run a serious risk of death by collision with the wire sheep fences so common on many moors.
This danger can be to a great extent averted by having all wire fences carefully bushed" with bits of brushwood. Small branches of larch are best for this purpose, as they can be easily turned into the wires, and do not readily blow out — a fair-sized branch every 5 yards is sufficient. Spruce branches are also used. Telegraph wires are not so common on a moor as fences, and not nearly so dangerous, while the cost of protecting the birds from them by game-guards makes it hardly worth while to consider them.
The Grouse, like the Domestic Fowl, the Pheasant, and the Partridge, is a "dusting" bird, and wherever a peaty or sandy bank has a sunny exposure a "scrape," with a feather or two half embedded in the soil, is to be seen. The fine particles of impalpable dust, by getting into the breathing apertures of the troublesome insects which are found on the birds, afford the latter temporary
- ↑ Colquhoun, "The Moor and the Loch," p. 184. 6th Edition. Edinburgh: William Blackwood & Sons, 1884.
