8 SMITHSONIAN MISCELLANEOUS COLLECTIONS VOL. I50 



hunting, but some are still found in most extensive tracts of original 

 forest, where they are able to maintain themselves through their 

 secretive habits. In unsettled regions, especially in hill country, they 

 are often common. Occasionally several may be found together, but 

 it is more usual to encounter pairs or single birds. In thinly settled 

 sections they are unsuspicious and, though they seek cover, are not 

 difficult to see ; but when much hunted careful approach is necessary 

 to obtain a glimpse of them, as at any alarm they slip quietly away 

 through the ground cover, aided in concealment by the dim light 

 and heavy shadows characteristic of their haunts. Occasionally one 

 that becomes startled will fly, rising at a sharp angle with a roar of 

 wings to 3 to 15 meters from the ground, and then drive swiftly away 

 behind the protective screen of the leaves of the undergrowth and 

 lower branches of the trees. The flight does not continue far, and 

 when once more on the ground it is seldom that the bird will flush 

 again. In areas where they have been little molested rarely one may 

 alight on a large tree limb, but this is unusual. E. A. Goldman in a 

 manuscript note records one such incident, and on one occasion I 

 had one stop briefly on a horizontal tree trunk projecting from the 

 side of a wide barranca. Where the jungle is sufficiently dry it is 

 common to find their dusting places in open areas on the forest floor. 



The call note is a tremulous whistle, repeated several times, at first 

 slowly and then, toward the end, more rapidly in slightly higher 

 tone. Though heard in daytime, especially in early morning and 

 late afternoon, their calls come also through the night, carrying to 

 the human listener a feeling of the mystery that surrounds the 

 nocturnal life of the darker hours. Occasionally a tinamou is en- 

 countered in night hunting but though the birds may be seen the 

 eyes are so small that it is sometimes difficult to detect their deep red 

 reflection in the beam of the jack light. 



The accumulated data indicate a laying season in Panama that 

 begins in January and extends to July. The available information 

 covers a period of 40 years and comes mainly from the Pacific slope 

 between Chiriqui and Darien and the Atlantic drainage at Barro 

 Colorado Island. It indicates that the breeding period is initiated at 

 the opening of the dry season and continues into the period of rains. 

 It must vary in its period with individual groups of the birds, since 

 so far as is known there is only one brood each season. 



The nests that I have seen have been placed against the base of a 

 tree, living or dead, sheltered between the projecting flanges of 



