in 1909 the austro-hungarian army adopted the pike-grey ("hechtgrau") as the colour of the field service uniform of its infantry, artillery, engineers and transport units. previously it had been reserved for jaeger and landwehr regiments. following the outbreak of world war i the light blue-grey shade of "hechtgrau" proved unsuited for campaigning in europe and from 1915 onwards the grey-green "feldgrau" was substituted.