IO 



caps they are a pair and where there is only one it is a cock. 

 This is the case with the Plumbeous. It is curious too, how the 

 cocks outnumber the hens, at this time of the year at any rate. 

 I have noticed this with many other species, but it is particularly 

 noticeable with those birds frequenting open and more or less 

 fixed abodes. To return to this half-mile of river, this will also 

 probably accommodate a Spotted and a Little Forktail, a pair of 

 Dippers, a few Wagtails (a nuisance to the trapper who does not 

 want them), a Whistling Thrush or so (a nuisance in another 

 way) and a few noisy Streaked Laughing Thrushes in the Khud 

 bushes. These might be called the regular inhabitants. The 

 beautiful Crested Black and White Kingfisher is also generally to 

 be seen sometime during the day, but his stretch covers a larger 

 area. Other birds, of course, are also to be seen, Chukor creep- 

 ing down for a drink, Pigeon, a stray Hawk or so, or an Eagle or 

 Lammergeier moving up or down, and sundry small birds, but 

 they are present by chance. 



The Little Forktail is perhaps the most interesting to 

 watch. The way he plunges into quite deep, swift water and runs 

 along the bottom up stream is always a marvel to me, and I have 

 watched him do this at distance of a few feet only. A good many 

 of us have stood inside a waterfall where one is comparatively 

 dry, and no doubt the little chap is fond of this too, but he also 

 likes running up in the water on apparently most slippery rocks. 

 It is astonishing why he is not beaten down again, but he bobs out 

 at the top quite spick and span, flies busily to the bottom and runs 

 up again, apparently getting food on the way. He is so busy at 

 this game that if one is lucky at the start as to position one can 

 get quite close by only moving when he is on the journey up. 

 In one place I believe I could have caught him if smart with a 

 lauding net, which on the whole I am glad I did not have with 

 me. He has quite defeated my endeavours to trap him, like 

 those annoying Black Crested Tits, which laugh at my traps and 

 bathe joyously within a yard or so of me, and within a foot or so 

 of my traps in the channel which waters my garden from the 

 tap. The other Tits (the Grey and the Green-back) which I do 

 not want, continually catch themselves, but not the Crested. The 

 Plumbeous Redstart by no means minds getting wet, but he won't 



