HIMALAYAN CUCKOO 85 



ployed it is, I believe, always silent and, even in its movements, 

 very quiet and secretive unless it is being harassed by small birds 

 who hunt it just as they do the common cuckoo. I have not seen 

 this bird feeding in bushes or on the ground even when there are 

 numerous caterpillars or a flight of termites to tempt it. 



When on migration also this cuckoo seems to keep to forest or to 

 exceptionally well-wooded country, and I have no record of its hav- 

 ing been found in the open in India, though obviously it must 

 sometimes pass over such country in its movements from one district 

 to another, more especially in the northwest. 



Spring. — In Kashmir and the northwest Himalayas the birds 

 arrive from the lower hills and the plains adjoining them in April, 

 a few apparently in the first fortnight, but the majority not until 

 the last week or so. In Sikkim they arrive a good deal earlier, and 

 Stevens (1925) records them as seen at Go])aldhara in the Rambong 

 Valley about tlie middle of March "when it ascends to an elevation 

 of 7,000 feet," while he heard them calling at the same place as 

 early as March 12. Farther east in Assam it does not arrive at its 

 breeding quarters in the higher hills until about the first week in 

 April and then only in small numbers. In Burma at elevations of 

 about 4,000 feet and over it breeds about a fortnight earlier and is 

 in full call by the last week in March. 



This cuckoo is possibly only a partial migrant in India, leaving 

 the higher hills for the broken foothills, where it may be found more 

 or less throughout the winter, as well as in the plains immediately 

 adjoining them. To the east, however, as I show under the fall 

 migration notes, it is a true migrant. According to La Touche 

 (1931-1936), during the spring migration north the Himalayan 

 cuckoo "appears in China from about the 10th April to the end 

 of May," and he records three cuckoos taken at Shaweishan on 

 May 1, 16, and 17. These birds were presumably on their way north 

 to eastern Siberia or Manchuria. 



La Touche does not think that this bird breeds anywhere in the 

 Cliinese Hills, its place being taken by the local breeding ra^e 

 kelungen&is. 



The 38 eggs in my collection were taken as follows: Three in 

 April, 14 in May, 20 in June, none in July, and 1 in August. The 

 earliest date was April 25, 1915, and the latest August 20, 1914. At 

 the same time an egg taken in the Chin Hills on April 30 was on the 

 point of hatching, so, in the Burmese Hills, some eggs must be laid 

 in the middle of that month, birds arriving in their breeding haunts 

 at least a fortnight earlier. Other eggs that have passed through 

 my hands were all taken within these dates so far as I have re- 

 corded them, so they may be accepted as confirming my dates for 

 migration. 



