Part 18

* * * * *

Nature's Laws

Yet it is hardly fair to compare pheasants to partridges. The difference in their habits of life makes it necessary that partridges should learn to use their wings more quickly than pheasants. They will fly when no larger than starlings, but pheasants grow as big as full-grown partridges before making much use of their wings. Partridges mature the more quickly: hatched in mid-June they are nearly full grown by September, while pheasants, born in May, are still in their baby stage in October. Then the habit of the partridges to roost in coveys on the ground fosters the instinct to spring into the air and fly on the first sign of danger, all in a covey acting as one bird for mutual protection. There is some little excuse for the young pheasants that butt into wire with such foolish persistency--they are so near to the wire that their legs have no chance to launch them fairly into the air. While the desire of a pheasant, on meeting wire outside a wood, is to pass through into the covert, the idea of the partridge is to turn about, and fly back to the fields whence it came. The effect of a line of wire-netting on wild creatures seems to be that they imagine they are enclosed on all sides. A half-grown leveret cantered before us for quite two miles alongside netting to the left of him; only after covering this distance did it seem to dawn upon him that by turning to the right he might go his way to freedom.

* * * * *

The Partridge June

What are the ideal conditions for partridges? First, an old-fashioned April--growing weather. Then an old-fashioned May, with blue skies and genial sunshine, to be followed by a June without a drop of rain that would hurt a fly by day, with occasional warm sprayings of rain by night, to help on the insect-supply for the chicks, and to keep the soil just as partridges like it when scratching for insects, but not wet enough to clog their feet. The ideal June--the partridge June--has warm nights and fine sunny days, without too much scorching sunshine. The fine weather must go on during the first part of July in the interests of the later-hatched chicks; and if August can behave as it should, so much the better--but the most important thing is a partridge June. Nothing can make amends to the partridges for a wet, cold June; for nothing can bring their dead chicks to life.

* * * * *

Favoured Pheasants

We need not think of the effect of frost on partridge eggs, for the birds cover their eggs when they leave them, until they are well on their way to hatching, with wonderful care, regularity, and thoroughness; and here they have the advantage of pheasants, which rarely cover their eggs when off the nest. Another advantage of the partridge is the hen's faithful mate--to help to shelter the brood from the weather and keep them warm. One bird might be able to manage this for fifteen little ones during their first week of life; but afterwards she could not possibly give the vital warmth to more than half her offspring. To the chicks of the pheasant hen a risky time is between the shedding of the soft fluffy down of infancy and the growth of feathers proof against cold and wet. Where pheasants have the advantage is that their hatching-time is spread over many weeks; so that whereas partridges may have their hopes ruined by a week or by a few days, or even a few hours of bad weather, the pheasants' hopes are never blighted while summer lasts.

It may be urged that if there are few young partridges there must be few young pheasants, and this to some extent is true. Though the breeding conditions of pheasant and partridge are very different, a bad season for one can hardly be a good season for the other. With partridges, the great trouble is that nearly all of them nest about the same time: where one brood suffers from bad weather, thousands must suffer. For ten days after hatching, partridges are at the mercy of the weather. Let one of those marble-sized drops of rain strike a newly hatched chick, and its day is done. As one sharp frost destroys all the apple-crop of a countryside, if it comes when the trees are in full bloom, so a deluge in mid-June is fatal to all young partridges. Even a day's thunder-rain, between the fifteenth and thirtieth of June, would almost excuse a partridge keeper if he committed suicide--though we have never heard of such a thing.

Heavy warm rain is bad enough--heavy cold rain is simply disastrous when it falls day after day, for weeks, from the time when most partridge eggs begin to hatch, until all except the second clutches are hatched--or flooded out. It is hardly worth considering whether the wet or the cold claims most victims: enough that if wet fails to bring about a tragedy, cold finishes the work. The sunless days, the everlasting rain, the drenching herbage, and the sodden soil wipe out most broods to a bird. It is not, as many suppose, a question of a good hatch that controls the supply for September, but it is simply a question of the weather for the first fortnight after hatching. Usually, if any eggs in a nest hatch, all the eggs hatch; but we may say that if only half the eggs in each nest hatched, and a fine fortnight followed, more birds would be reared than if every egg in each nest produced two chicks, and a drenching fortnight then set in.

In a wretched hatching season, the best luck is often with the intermediate early broods. They fare least badly. As to second nests, it never makes much difference to September's sport whether they prosper or not. A covey of a dozen, in a September following a wet June, is a good covey. The most general coveys are coveys of old birds--or coveys consisting of one young bird! There is no more reliable sign of a poor partridge crop than a good year for roots.

* * * * *

A Covey of Ancients

We remember how an experienced keeper was quite at sea in his judgment of a particular covey. It had been a bad season, and after the corn had been cut he knew of only one good covey; it numbered nine birds, and fine forward birds they were. On this covey he set great store against the coming of September. It happened that he was bidden to shoot a couple of brace of young birds for dinner at "the house" on the First. With his first shot at the covey he bagged the old cock. He pursued the rest of the covey, bagged another bird, also an old cock. Disappointed but still hopeful, again he pursued the covey, again he bagged another bird, and again it was an old cock that fell to his gun. He went on until he bagged the ninth and last bird, and the ninth was no better than all the others. It was a sad keeper who went home that day with his nine old birds. Ever since he has been sceptical about coveys of forward birds. But he always says now that foxes at least show gallantry in the matter of "ladies first."

* * * * *

Keepers' Woe

If June proves wet, despair reigns in the partridge keeper's breast. With hopeless eyes he looks forward to the coming season. One keeper of our acquaintance, one wet midsummer, a time when, in a promising season, he would have had no moment to spare from the care of his young birds, married, and went for a honeymoon. "Lor' love ye," said another, weary of June rain, "I might just as well 've bin in bed for a month past." A common remark made by keepers in a rainy June is the mournful plaint, "Ye don't see no feetmarks on the roads, but old un's."

* * * * *

Red-Legs

The more we see of red-legged partridges the more we appreciate their powers of running. They are wonderful birds for eluding the tactics of walking-up parties; even where the birds are plentiful it is rare to walk-up one within gunshot. The red-leg also suffers by comparison with the English birds on the table. But he is a grand bird for driving (when he is headed and forced to fly), seldom coming in coveys--so that a dozen red-legs may afford as many shots as a dozen unbroken English coveys. And they come straight, more in the style of grouse than of the brown partridges. The two types seldom intermingle, being of different species and different genera. In some places an ill-feeling is still harboured against the bigger and handsomer red-legs, and it is thought that they drive away the English birds.

* * * * *

Water for Game-Birds

It is a lucky keeper whose shoot is watered by springs and brooks which never fail in time of drought, for a continuous supply of water means much to the success of game-breeding. But streams have their dangers: birds will be attracted to the banks at nesting-time, and if heavy rains follow, their nests may be destroyed by the floods. A greater danger lies in the streams which are winter water-courses only and dry up in the spring. Herbage will grow luxuriantly at the stream-side, and birds will be enticed to nest in places where, after a heavy rainfall, there will rush a raging torrent, to carry away birds, nests, eggs and all. Some say that nesting birds can foretell the weather, and choose their nesting-places accordingly--building on the banks and higher ground if the season will be wet, but in the hollows if dry. No doubt their choice is influenced only by prevailing weather, and the position of suitable cover. In a cold, late spring, grass-fields offer poor shelter, and so the birds choose the hedges and dikes, where the wild, weedy growth finds moisture for its roots and protection for its top-growth. When birds are sitting, the less they have to do with water the better for their hopes.

Perhaps it is better for birds to be drowned than to suffer from drought. A long spell of hot weather is not in itself harmful to the broods, for sunshine is the essence of life in their early days; but while drought does not cause suffering through lack of water, it means lack of juicy food, and that is fatal. Succulent weed-seeds and grubs and insects are not to be found; the milkiness is dried out of the seeds, and grubs and worms go deeply into the soil, beyond scratching distance. But food enough of sorts could be found during the severest drought if a little water were also available. Ponds are useful only to a small proportion of the broods, and become waterless when drought is long enough to threaten serious loss. Heavy thunder-rain after drought completes the work of destruction. If it comes within a fortnight of Midsummer Day, it means calamity to hosts of young partridges, who may be overwhelmed before they can reach their parents, or, gaining that shelter, are drowned when the ground is swamped.

Many keepers never give their young pheasants water until they have been removed from the rearing-field to covert--but their food is made dry or moist according to the weather. This plan answers well enough until there comes a hot, dry spell which ends suddenly in rain, and then the chicks drink immoderately, and suffer the penalty. That chicks take the first chance to drink the raindrops from the herbage shows that water is good for them; and the best plan is to provide them with a continuous supply of clean water from the beginning, so that they never become thirsty and drink themselves to death.

* * * * *

Ideal Coverts