180 INDIAN SPOETING BIEDS 



way of getting it is to treat it like one, and shoot it running, as 

 Hume says. It is a perching bird, roosting at night, and being 

 fond of taking to a thick bush when put up by a dog, a refuge 

 from which it is most difficult to dislodge it. In compensation 

 for its extreme aversion to giving a sporting chance to the gunner, 

 it is an excellent bird for the table, and Hume considers it best 

 of the Indian partridge tribe. But it is hard to get many of 

 them ; about two or three in a day's shooting is about what may 

 be expected on the Nilgiris, where they range up to 5,000 feet, 

 or even over. Although often in coveys of four or five, they 

 even then do not go off all at once, but now and then, and here 

 and there, and they are frequently found in pairs, sometimes 

 even alone. 



The cackling call which re-unites a scattered flock is said to 

 be much like that of a hen, and they are credited with a crowing 

 call, which seems, however, to be rarely heard. Their chief food 

 is jungle berries, seeds, and insects, but they will occasionally 

 come into fields for grain, and they seem to need water frequently, 

 as they are constantly to be found near it, and a thorny ravine 

 with a stream in it is the surest locality for them. 



This bird is suspected of breeding twice in the year, but the 

 only certain season is during the first six months ; the nest is on 

 the ground, in cover, and the eggs are rather like small hens' 

 eggs of the brown-tinted variety so much esteemed; they vary 

 a good deal in shade, and seven or eight seems to be the maximum 

 set, though smaller and larger numbers occur. 



The red spur-fowl is fairly well off for names ; if its Mahratta 

 title, kokatii, does describe its call well, it certainly must have 

 a note that can be fairly called a crow. The Deccan Mahrattas, 

 however, call it Kustoor ; in Telugu it is Yerra or Jitta-kodi, 

 and in Tamil Sarrava koli. 



Painted Spur-fowl. 



Galloperdix lunulatus. Askal, Orissa. 



The white- spotted cock of the painted spur-fowl is a very 

 pretty and distinct-looking bird, as far as the plumage goes, 

 but the absence of the bright red colouring of the bill and 



