ENGLISH GROUSE GROUND. .
WHEN a Yorkshireman, or a Staffordshire man, or a dalesman of Derbyshire says that the drive to such and such a place lies " through grouse ground," the words convey a very definite meaning both to him and to his hearers. But though the haunts of the Scottish grouse are very well known to the majority of Englishmen who travel at all, the characteristic English moors are far less often visited by any but sportsmen. Yet their extent, both in England and Wales, is very large, and, acre for acre, they are far more prolific in the birds than the moors and mountain- sides of Scotland. It is one of the most interesting examples of the extension of the range of a species that the red grouse, which is practically identical with the " ryper " of, Scandi- navia, and is by nature and connection a thoroughly Arctlic and circumpolar bird everywhere else, makes an exception in this one island by going far to the south. The Yorkshire moors carry more grouse than any others. But there are moors still farther south—in Derbyshire, for instance-r• where grouse increase and multiply, while there are goad moors in Staffordshire, Cheshire, North Wales, and a few grouse even in Shropshire, the most southerly in the world. The ptarmigan, on the other hand., is not an Arc*, but an "Alpine," bird, in the sense that it appears on ,moot of the mountains of Northern and Central Europe and Asia which reach a certain height, just as the Alpine flowers and the " blue " hare reappear according to altitude, and not according to latitude. There are Arctic ptarmigan ; but there are also ptarmigan in the Alps and on various moun- tain ranges across North Central Asia, while a bird corre- sponding to it appears on the Rocky Mountains.
The moment that the call of the grouse is heard. the intruder on the moor or fell knows instantly that .he has entered a. region unlike that of the: worldbelow, and that he has accomplished the pleasing feat known . to naturalists as "vertical migration," which brings him among fresh. scenery, fresh plants and flowers, new mammals (if he is in Scotland or
on the Continent, but not in England, where we have neither the " blue" hare, the marmot, nor the various wild goats), and an entirely fresh bird life. In one particular the above is not quite accurate, for he does find one specialised domestic mammal, the "heather " sheep,—i.e., the Scotch curly-horned, black-faced breed, which eats heather just as eagerly as other sheep eat grass. It is also a country where no human sounds penetrate, not even the whistle of the distant trains, the smoke of which, like little lines of woolly beads, can be seen creeping down the valleys far below.
Perhaps the most beautiful moors are those rising some way down the course of one of the large Yorkshire rivers. Over the broad and swift stream, with its endless sequence of pool, glide, and ripple, or cascades among the rocks, hang the woods of oak and ash and thorn. Pass up by the side of one of the tributary " becks," and climb the faces where grass and timber trees give way to bracken and ancient thorns, foxgloves, and wild raspberries, and you reach the last stone wall, which marks off the " intake " from the open moor. Through the gate the heather and " bents " begin, and it is two to one that here an old cock grouse rises, utters his bleating note, and swings off high into the wind up the moor-side. There are still four hundred feet to climb before reaching the edge of the grouse ground proper, where for mile after mile, as far as the eye can see, ridge after ridge of moor runs on to the sky-line. If you are with the keeper, and very few other than keepers go on to these moors before the Twelfth, he will stop at the wall of the "intake," and walk along it for a few hundred yards examining his traps. This wall is his frontier, his first and only line of defence for his lieloved grouse against the four-footed enemies in the valley 13elow. If once they get up on to the open moor, it is difficult to cope with them. So every hole through the wall is armed With a trap, like a cannon in an embrasure, to stop the stoats, weasels, and predatory cats, whose motto is " Excelsior!" and wilose greatest delicacy is a young grouse. The " becks," which, though now merely chains of shallow pools among rocks and gigantic stones, are roaring torrents after rain, and have scored the faces of the everlasting hills with their downward furrows, are also highways by which all four-footed creatures Seek to ascend the moors. At this time the small trout lie imprisoned in the pools, often only just covered with water, and both stoats and cats seek to vary their grouse dinner with a' previous course of trout. Out on the moor itself is no such monotony as might be fancied, where the flora and fauna are somewhat reduced in number, and the "tops" are, or rather were, absolutely untouched by man. No part of the summits is flat. It is all diversified with deep hollows, long rolls of heather, billows of hill, and corresponding depths of incurved upland valley. If it is an " unimproved" moor, the heather, now just coming into blossom, seems for the moment to dominate alL It is one vast sea of colour, like damsons and cream, deep, soft-looking, and unbroken. But that is not the appearance of the modern, or " improved," moor, nor, in truth, does the heather pervade the moor to anything like the extent which might be guessed even on the " unimproved" ground. It is deeply scored with wet bog, green moss, green rushes, and " bents," a darker green sedge which plays a very important part on a moor as food for grouse. But the well-managed moor, owned by those who know that grouse are the most valuable stock that can be kept there, and that they will live there in company with, and in addition to, " heather " sheep, is highly diversified. The great object is to produce the maximum of young heather, while at the same time keeping other long heather close by as cover for the little birds in thunderstorms and ii;iilstorms. So the moor is most carefully burnt in strips, each strip being fired once in seven years ; and as it is the tendency of all good servants to be exact and methodical, your good keeper would Eke, if he could, to make the whole moor into a vast chessboard, ranging from the black of this year's burning, through the various greens of heather of different ages, to the damson-and-cream of the perfect and old heather blossom. Fortunately, wind and weather and wet ground frustrate this ideal The lines of " batteries " are too far apart to intrude themselves on the landscape, and other- wise the moor is as Nature made it. But man has multiplied the 'birds. No one who has not seen it would believe what num- bers of grouse a good moor carries for the week or two before the shooting begins. The supply of food is enormous, owing
partly to the artificial production of young heather; partly to the same causes producing young bilberry leaves, which the grouse eat; partly to the insects, now numerous on the moor; and partly to the fact that the before-mentioned " bents " or sedges, which take the place of grass on these heights, are all in seed, and that these seeds are excellent food for grouse. Though not equal to the extraordinary summer stock of food on the " tundra," where the ripe fruit of last year covered by the snow is first eaten, and then the early summer crop forced by the never-setting sun ripens, it is very large, and accounts for the prodigious number of birds which well-managed moors carry. As three-quarters of these are shot in August and September, the number left is not more than the moor will feed in the time of winter and famine.
Two other birds cannot fail to excite interest on these North Yorkshire moors. They are the merlin and the ring- ousel. The former come there in very considerable numbers to breed. No less than five nests were found on one extensive property this year. They live mainly on the pipits, which swarm on the moors, and are the only common species of small bird seen at these heights. The ring-ousels attract attention at once by their numbers and their note, and the white ring on their throats. At the present time they are seen in great numbers all over the moors, rising constantly with their harsh note from the heather and bracken. They are encouraged by the keepers, as they give warning when stoats or vermin are about. The merlin, it is to be feared, does not fare so well.
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