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.
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