Scientific name: Lagopus lagopus (Linnaeus, 1758)
Bird group: Game birds
Field characters. 37-42 cm. A small-headed, plump bird with rather short, rectangular wings and black tail. Characteristic flight action with series of rapid, strong, whirring wing-beats alternated with long glides on bowed wings. Plumage pattern varies with race and season. In Willow Grouse Lagopus l. lagopus adult male breeding plumage with upperparts, chin, neck, and upper chest red-brown barred and blotched darker; wings and underbody white; kidney-shaped orange patch above eye. In winter the male is entirely white except for black tail-feathers. Female plumage as in male but summer plumage tawnier with more obvious dark bars. Juvenile as female. In Red Grouse Lagopus l. scoticus adult male and female breeding has red-brown plumage, whitish feathered legs, black wing-quills and tail. Winter plumage of female similar to summer dress but with white under wing-coverts. Juvenile as adult.
Voice. When flushed it utters a cackling 'kwok, kok-ok-ok...'; song of male is a crowing 'go-back go-back'.
Distribution. Red Grouse is a common resident in Britain and Ireland; Willow Grouse is a common resident in Fenno-Scandia and northern Russia.
Habitat. In the breeding season, frequents treeless tundra, moors, heaths and bogs. Outside the breeding season Red Grouse moves to lower ground, and sometimes onto farmland; Willow Grouse moves into wooded tundra and woodlands.
Food. An almost completely herbivorous species, feeding on heather, willow, and catkins, buds and twigs of birch, berries, and newly grown leaves of deciduous plants. May also take insects. Takes food mostly from ground but may feed also in trees.