The Grouse in Health and in Disease/Chapter I

by Committee of Inquiry on Grouse Disease

CHAPTER I

the systematic position of the grouse

By A. H. Evans

The name Grouse, in the form "Grows," has been traced back by Salusbury Brereton to the reign of Henry VIII. (1531), and in its present form to 1603. But, since it first occurs in an ordinance for the regulation of the Royal History of
the name
Grouse. Household at Eltham in Kent, it ought in all probability to be applied the name to the Black Grouse which may then have inhabited that county, though no actual record has yet been discovered. Further particulars are given by Professor Newton in his "Dictionary of Birds."^[1] The appellation has, however, by universal consent been long transferred to the Red Grouse, the Moorfowl of our forefathers, and when standing alone would never now be understood otherwise.

This species is the most characteristic bird of the Scottish moorlands, including the Hebrides and the Orkneys, and is plentiful thence to the northern counties of England; in few places is it more numerous than on the Distributionmoors of South Yorkshire and Derbyshire in the vicinity of Sheffield; while to the west it not only occurs in decreasing numbers to Shropshire, but is found in Wales as far south as Glamorganshire, and in Ireland in most suitable localities. Attempts have been made to acclimatise it to the north and south of its proper range; but the few pairs turned down in Acclimatisation Shetland between 1858 and 1883, with a greater number in 1901, have never thriven, while their descendants are apparently extinct, and the same may be said of those introduced into Surrey, Norfolk, and elsewhere, with three exceptions. The first instance is that noticed by Professor Newton in his "Dictionary of Birds,"^[2] when Baron Dickson succeeded in acclimatising the species near Gottenburg in Sweden; the second is that of its introduction in 1893-1894 to the Hohe Venn, a high tract of moorland on the borders of Belgium and Germany, south of Spa, where Red Grouse are still thriving; and the third the successful experiment on Lord Iveagh's property at Icklingham in Suffolk in 1903, where the birds, despite the necessity of an artificial water supply on the dry, sandy heaths, had increased in 1909, and appeared likely in 1910 to form a permanent colony. In the Hobe Venn district after two failures fifty pairs or more were liberated in August 1894, and by 1901 had increased to about a thousand head in spite of regular shooting. Professor Somerville of Oxford, who has kindly furnished particulars, saw the birds there in September 1910.

During the last twenty years it has been strongly borne in upon the general public, as well as sportsmen, that the welfare of the Grouse is an affair of national Economic
importance
of Grouse.interest; for game of every description is becoming less and less a luxury of the rich, and more and more a regular factor of our food supply, facts which cannot be ignored by the modern economist, and are now considered to be well within the province of the Government, which has at last consented to bestir itself in the matter.

Here I propose to give a brief account of the position of the Red Grouse in the class of birds. In nearly all linear systems of classification put forward by Classificationmodern systematists, whether they start from the highest or from the lowest forms of creation, the large order Galliformes — or its equivalent — stands about midway in the carinate or keel-breasted birds, being connected most closely on the one hand with the Falconiformes and Anseriformes, on the other with the Gruiformes and Charadriiformes. Its position is thus well ascertained, and no serious doubts have been raised as to its constituent members, except that the Tinamidæ (Tinamous) of South America, which have been sometimes included in it, are now by pretty general consent placed next to the Ratite birds, with keelless breastbone.

Under the order Galliformes may be placed in suborders the curious Mesites of Madagascar, the no less peculiar Opisthocomus or Hoatzin of northern South America, and the Old World Turnices (Button Quails) with their close ally Pedionomus; but the only suborder with which we are here concerned is that known by the name of Galli. Under the Galli, again, we need only make passing reference to the group called by Huxley, Peristeropodes, where the toes are all in one plane; this includes the families Megapodiidææ or Mound-Builders of the eastern tropics, and the Cracidæ or Curassows of the neotropical countries. Huxley's second group, the Alectoropodes, with an elevated hind toe, is equivalent to the family Phasianidæ, which may be subdivided into the subfamilies Numidinæ, or Guinea-fowls, of Africa, the Meleagrinæ, or Turkeys, of America, the Odontophorinæ, or "American Partridges," the Phasianinæ, or Pheasant, Partridge, and Fowl alliance of the Old World, and the Tetraoninæ, or Grouse. The last-named might well be classed as a separate family Tetraonidææ, were it not for the great difficulty of placing correctly such forms as Caccabis (Red-legged Partridge), Francolinus (Fraucolin), and Coturnix (Quail), which are so nearly allied to both Partridges and Grouse that we may even doubt the advisability of allowing a separate subfamily Tetraoninæ at all.

Grouse, as thus limited, are entirely confined to the Holarctic region, the great majority of the species being inhabitants of the New World, though a fair number, including the fine Capercailzie, the Black Grouse and Distributionthe Hazel Grouse, are to be found in various parts of the Old World.

The Red Grouse of Britain belongs to Lagopus, the only genus of Grouse common to both hemispheres, in which even the digits are feathered. This contains six well-defined species: the Spitsbergen Ptarmigan (L. hemileucurus) and the Rocky Mountain Ptarmigan {L. leucurus) — only found in the regions after which they are named — the Ptarmigan of Scotland and the mountains of the Palæarctic area {L. mutus), the "Iceland" Ptarmigan of that island, Greenland and the lower grounds of Northern Siberia and Arctic America (L. rupestris), the Willow Grouse of the north of Europe, Asia, and America (L. albus), and the British bird (L. scoticus) — with which alone we are concerned — indigenous in no other country.

All the forms of the genus Lagopus are anatomically identical, but the Red Grouse differs from the remaining members in that it does not turn white in winter. It has been thought to be merely the local representative of the Variation.Willow Grouse in Britain, though it differs from that species even in its summer plumage, and never possesses white wing-quills. It varies considerably in coloration, as will be seen from the following quotation from "The Cambridge Natural History." "The male in both summer and winter is more or less chestnut-brown above, with black markings and a reddish head; the lower parts are similar, but are usually spotted with white. In autumn the brown of the upper parts becomes buff, and the lower surface is barred with buff and black. Mr Ogilvie-Grant recognises three types of plumage in the male, a red form with no white spots, from Ireland and Western Scotland; a blackish variety comparatively rarely found; and another largely spotted with white below or even above. Intermediate specimens constitute the bulk of our birds. The female exhibits, moreover, a buff-spotted and a buff-barred form; but in summer she is typically black above with concentric buff markings, and buff below with black bars. Her autumn plumage, which continues throughout the winter, is black, spotted with buff" and barred with rufous."^[3] As we write, Mr Ogilvie-Grant has published in the "Bulletin of the British Ornithologists' Club"^[4] an elaborate account of the changes of plumage undergone by the Red Grouse, and of the points wherein he differs from Mr Millais and Dr Wilson; but this is not the place to enter into controversial matters, and our readers must form their own opinions on the subject.^[5] Various reasons have been suggested for the absence of a white winter plumage in the British bird, for which reference may be made to the late Professor Newton's "Dictionary of Birds."^[6]

The Red Grouse is not polygamous; the birds pair very early in the year, and consequently breed at a time when the eggs are apt to be seriously damaged Habitsby late frosts, while the young often suffer from similar causes. The usual haunts are moors clothed with heather (Erica) and ling (Calluna) but in some parts at least of the north-west of England they are to be found on hills covered with crowberry (Empetrum), rush (Juncus), and other vegetation, where little if any heather or ling grows. As a rule, the nest is a slight structure of bents and so forth, placed in thick heather or grass, or even on almost bare ground; the eggs, ranging from five or six more than a dozen in number, have a yellowish or buffish white ground-colour, normally blotched and spotted with reddish or blackish brown. The colour of the markings, however, varies considerably; in some specimens they are purplish or very rich red, in others orange-red. The eggs measure nearly 2 inches by rather more than 1. The cock utters his well-known crow at all seasons; the hen has a somewhat different note in the mating season, and when in charge of the young. The cock has also a clear ringing cry.

The general habits will be dealt with in the later chapters.

1. A. Newton, "Dictionary of birds," p. 388. London: A. and C. Black, 1893-1896. VOL. I.
2. "Dictionary of Birds," p. 389
3. "Cambridge Natural History," vol. ix., Birds, p. 338. Cambridge, 1899
4. "British Ornithologists Club," vol. xxii. p. 122. London, 1910.
5. Vide also chap. iii.
6. "Dictionary of Birds," p. 391.