The _Lagopus Alpinus_ is not shy in summer, and early in autumn may be approached very closely without taking flight. "Not unfrequently, indeed," says Mr. Lloyd, "the fowler or wayfarer finds himself in the very midst of a brood, without having been previously aware of its presence; but as the season advances the several families 'pack,' and they then become very wary, especially should they have become associated with the _Lagopus albus_, which is of a much wilder nature, and thus they keep together throughout the winter, and until the month of May, when they separate in pairs. Their favourite resorts are amongst stones and shingle, where they find shelter in bad weather, and from which in their summer plumage they are hardly to be distinguished." During the summer and autumn they feed on seeds and leaves, especially on those of the crakeberry (_Empetrum nigrum_), the leaves of which are green all the year round. When heavy storms of snow make these unattainable they devour the tender tops of willow and dwarf birch. "The easily satisfied appetite of the _Lagopus Alpinus_," says M. Barth, "coupled with the fact that the crakeberry grows in such profusion everywhere as in many places to cover the whole slope of the _fjall_, up to near the line of perpetual snow, explains the question why these birds never lack food in the higher regions, where one would least suppose it possible for any living creature to find the wherewithal to sustain existence. The crakeberry plant in some years has so many berries that the ground looks black with them; nevertheless, in those years I never found the berries themselves in the crop of this species, but only the stalks and leaves. After producing fruits in such abundance, the crakeberry plant would seem to require some time for rest, inasmuch as in the succeeding year scarcely a berry is to be seen on it. The Ptarmigan would therefore be very badly off if its taste only permitted it to feed on the berry and not on the stalk--another instance of the wise foresight of Nature. During pairing time the cry of the male is said to resemble the croak of a frog, or the snoring of a man. The female note is a low 'ü-ack, ü-ack.'"