Notes on the first species in the systematic list: Philip Murphy

A couple of notes on the first species on our latest BOU British list

Philip Murphy

Red-legged Partridge

it is somewhat ironic that the first species in the Systematic List in the 2020 Suffolk Bird report – red-legged Partridge – is the final species in the systematic List in the first Suffolk Bird report 70 years ago in 1950! the species order used in the 1950 Suffolk Bird report was Witherby’s check-List of British Birds (1941).

Capercaillie

Whilst red-legged Partridge is the first Suffolk bird on the list, the first species from a British perspective is actually capercaillie Tetrao urogallus. regarding capercaillie – on page 486 of c. B. ticehurst’s avifauna “A History of the Birds of Suffolk” (1932) we read that “in 1865 the late Maharajah Duleep Singh turned out at Elveden some Capercailzie (sic) (Tetrao urogallus) from Scotland, which, however, soon died off. In 1878 some eggs were procured from the same source; these were successfully hatched but the young soon pined and died owing, it as thought, to unsuitable food”

Black Grouse and Red Grouse

following on in the British list are Black Grouse, Ptarmigan and red Grouse.

Attempts to introduce Black Grouse Lyrurus tetrix and red Grouse Lagopus lagopus to Suffolk heaths both on the coast and in Breckland between the mid-nineteenth century and the early years of the 20th century were more successful than those of capercaillie. However, Suffolk’s relatively dry climate, predation by red foxes Vulpes vulpes and the intervention of the first World War were probably the principal causes for both species becoming extinct in Suffolk by the 1930s.