WILLOW PTARMIGANS have a strong black bill, with scarlet eye-brows, very large and beautiful in the male, but less conspicuous in the female. In Summer they are brown, elegantly barred and mottled with orange, white, and black; and at that season the males are very proud and handsome, but the females are less beautiful, being of one universal brown. As the Fall advances they change to a delicate white, except fourteen black feathers in the tail, which are also tipped with white; and their legs and feet, quite down to the nails, are warmly covered with feathers. IN the latter end of September and beginning of October they gather in flocks of some hundreds, and proceed from the open plains and the barren grounds, (where they usually breed) to the woods and brush-willows, where they hord together in a state of society, till dispersed by their common enemies, the hawks, or hunters. They are by far the most numerous of any of the Grouse species that are found in Hudson's Bay; and in some places, when permitted to remain undisturbed for a considerable time, their number is frequently so great, as almost to exceed credibility. I shall by no means exceed truth, if I assert that I have seen upward of four hundred in one flock near Churchill River; but the greatest number I ever saw was on the North side of Fort Nelson River in March 1768: at that time I saw thousands flying to the North, and the whole surface of the snow seemed to be in motion by those that were feeding on the tops of the short willows.

IT is remarked in those birds, as well as the Rock Ptarmigan, that they are provided with additional clothing, as it may be called; for every feather, from the largest to the smallest, except the quills and tail, are all double. The under-feather is soft and downy, shooting from the shaft of the larger; and is wonderfully adapted to their situation, as they not only brave the coldest Winters, but the species always burrow under the snow at nights, and at day-light come forth to feed. In Winter they are always found to frequent the banks of rivers and creeks, the sides of lakes and ponds, and the plains which abound with dwarf willows; for it is on the buds and tops of that tree they always feed during the Winter. In Summer they eat berries and small herbage. .(source - www.web.idirect.com)