128 INDIAN DUCKS 



a local migrant, visiting them only during the rains ; and this we 

 can well understand, knowing how many places in Northern and 

 North-western India change their character with the advent of the 

 rains from utterly dry, burnt-up tracts to well- watered, wet ones. 



Cripps says that they are not found in Dacca during the cold 

 weather ; but this I know is not now the case, as I have seen them 

 there at that season, only they keep to the wetter portions of the 

 district, and doubtless many do move to Silhet, where there is never 

 any want of swamps and bheels. In the same way many birds 

 leave Cachar as the water subsides and go into Silhet. In Bengal 

 I think the question is entirely one of water-supply, and Vv'here the 

 water is sufficient there these teal will remain independent of the 

 season. When, on the other hand, the water fails them, they go off 

 elsewhere. In Sind they are rainy-weather visitors only, and they 

 also leave the Deccan in great numbers as the waters dry up at the 

 end of the cold weather. They are found throughout the Terai, but 

 do not ascend very high, and most probably Hodgson's specimen was 

 not really obtained in Nepal. 



In Cachar they are extremely common all the year round in the 

 plains, but never ascend the hills at all. 



Hume, writing of this bird, says : — 



" It is essentially a tree Duck ; it must have trees as well as 

 water, and hence its entire absence from some pieces of water, in 

 treeless parts of Eajputana, for instance, where other species of 

 Duck abound during the cold season. Yet it prefers level, or fairly 

 level, tracts to very broken hilly country, and again, though in 

 some places, e.g., at Tavoy, it may be met with in rivers in 

 enormous flocks, it, as a rule, prefers moderate-sized lakes and ponds 

 to rivers. 



Owing to these preferences there are many tracts, as, for 

 instance, portions of the Deccan, where it is extremely rare." 



This is quite true, but in Eastern India, more especially 

 Bengal, nearly all the country is more or less well supplied with 

 trees and also water, so that local migrations are not necessary, and 

 therefore not indulged in except in the very narrowest sense of the 

 word. 



The same applies to Ceylon, where Legge describes them as 

 permanent residents, but moving to and from certain places with the 

 season. 



