150 INDIAN SPOETING BIEDS 



trying to dust in mud and water, when unlimited dusting ground 

 surrounded them on every side." He appears not to have seen 

 the actual act of soaking by the present species, but saw the 

 cocks pass over with their white breasts soaked in mud and 

 water, and he has often bred this bird (the western form) in 

 confinement, his old hen, the mother of many broods, having 

 died at the advanced age of nearly 20 years. 



Black-bellied Sand-grouse. 



Pterocles arenarius. Burra bhatta, Hindustani. 



The black belly which gives this fine sand-grouse its name 

 will also distinguish it from all our other species ; it is one of our 

 three large kinds, being as big as any ordinary pigeon. The hen 

 has the usual buff black-speckled plumage above, though black 

 below like her mate ; the cock has the head and breast grey, 

 the throat chestnut, and the upper parts elsewhere variegated 

 with grey and buffy-yellow. There are no long points to the 

 centre tail feathers as in our other large species. 



Although only a winter visitant to India, this sand-grouse is 

 probably the most numerous after the common kind, since it 

 arrives in enormous numbers. Hume, for instance, says " Driving 

 in November, 1867, the last stage into Fazilka from Ferozepore, 

 parallel to and on the average about two miles distant from the 

 Sutlej, over a hundred flocks, or parties of from four or five to 

 close upon one hundred each, flew over us during our fifteen miles 

 drive ; they were all going to the river to drink or returning 

 thence. Necessarily we can only have seen an exceedingly small 

 fraction of the total number that that morning crossed that little 

 stretch of road." 



But, although thus abundant locally, the black-bellied sand- 

 grouse is not widely distributed in India during its stay there, 

 but is confined to the North-west Provinces, and in most years 

 only really abundant, says Hume, in northern and western 

 Eajputana and the Punjab west of Umballa ; also, being averse 

 to heat, it comes rather late, about the middle of October and 

 leaves as a rule at the end of February. It has a wide uange out- 



