512 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY , Vol. XVI. 



No. XVI.— ON THE OCCURRENCE OF THE LADY AMHERST'S 



PHEASANT IN BURMA. 



The Society lately received a skin of an adult male specimen in full plumage 

 of the Lady Amherst's Pheasant {Chrysolophus amJierstice) from Lieut. W. W. 

 Van Someran, who shot it at a height of about 9,000 feet near Sadon in the 

 Myitkyina district of Upper Burma. 



As this is apparently the first recorded specimen that has been obtained within 

 British Iadian limits as recognised in the ' Fauna of British India ' the species 

 may now take its place in the list of our birds. 



As regards the known range of the species the Cat. Brit. M us. (Birds, Vol. 

 XXII) merely gives the habitat as " the mountains of Western China and 

 Eastern Thibet " and Elliot's Monograph of the Phasianida (1872) names " China 

 bordering on Eastern Thibet and Yunnan to the province of Setchnen." In the 

 published account of the Zoological researches of the Yunnan expeditions of 

 18G8 and 1875, the occurrence of the species is noted "on the hills between 

 Sanda and Momien and in the country to the north and west " and specimens 

 were obtained at Muangla and Momien in the Shan country over the Yunnan 

 frontier. 



The specimen is evidently a fine one as the tail measures 45*5 inches and the 

 wing 8 8 inches compared with 36 and 8*2 inches named in the Cat. Brit. Mus. 

 (Birds). There is a good deal more of the glossy green on the tips of the mantle 

 feathers the back and the bars on the central tail feathers, than the description 

 would lead one to expect. 



Lieutenant Van Someran writes : " They live, in these parts, up at a height of 

 8,000 feet and more, and I have never come across one below that level. From 

 what I have been told they seem to be fairly common across the frontier among 

 the high hills on the Chinese side." 



E. COMBER, f.z.s. 

 Bombay, 12th June, 1905. 



No XVII.-CATASTROPHE AMONGST THE YOUNG OF THE 

 INDIAN CLIFF-SWALLOWS (H [RONDO FLUVICOLA.) 

 On the 14th May, I visited a culvert over a small distribution canal, within a 

 few miles of Cawnpore, under which a whole colony of Hirundo fluvicola (The 

 Indian Cliff-Swallow) had nested. The parent birds were present in great numbers, 

 and were continually visiting the nests. On wading under the culvert I found 

 that a large proportion of the nests contained dead birds— young but fully fledged. 

 They were in nearly every case protruding far out of the narrow entrances of 

 the nests, and were full of a large maggot of sorts, a few however being 

 practically feathers and bones, and sufficiently inoffensive to enable me to send 

 you one. Smaller birds than those found dead, struggled from their nests and 

 managed to fly off when I approached, which emphasizes the peculiarity of the 

 occurrence. I surmised, at first, that a sudden rise in the water must have 



