ANAS PfECILORHYNCHA HAPaNGTONI 171 



On one occasion only did any of us see the bird in any numbers, 

 and on this Mr. ^loore came across a flock of about forty on a small 

 collection of shallow swamps on the road to Dimaji in Lakhimpur. 

 He obtained two or three specimens, and on his return to Dibrugarh 

 told me of the flock, and when I went out some ten days later the 

 flock was still there, and I got a pair in the first drive. They 

 refused to leave the swamps round about, but after the first two 

 shots had been fired it was impossible to get near them or to get 

 them to pass within shooting distance of our mychans. 



As a rule, we found the birds either singly or in pairs, less 

 often in small flocks of four or five birds, but in the former case 

 they were always in company with teal, gadwall or other ducks of 

 some kind. They were just as wild as all the other ducks in this 

 district, and the only way we could get them was by driving ; no 

 amount of artifice or care could get one within decent shooting 

 distance otherwise. We had small and extremely dicky mychans, or 

 platforms, made in difl'erent places in the huge bheels ; these were 

 well concealed by reeds and water-plants, and we got into them 

 with as little noise as possible, and then sent boats all round 

 about to put up the birds. The local people knew the habits of 

 the duck well, and generally managed to arrange the hiding-places 

 so that they were in the line of flight most often taken by the 

 birds, and we got a great deal of very pretty shooting in this way, 

 though our bags were not heavy. Still we often managed to pick 

 up thirty or forty birds, losing sometimes as many more in the 

 impenetrable cane-brakes, and by winged birds diving and so 

 escaping or being carried ofl" by the many eagles which infest 

 these waters. We could, of course, see all round us by peering 

 through the reeds, but there were four sides to watch on ; and 

 often, as we watched a flock coming up in front of us, a second 

 would come up from the opposite direction, and the first we knew 

 of it would be the sound of their wings as they hurtled through 

 the air high overhead. Sometimes, too, as we watched, a flight 

 of teal would rush by only a foot or two above the water, almost 

 passing out of fire before being spotted. Consequently, the shoot- 

 ing was not all it might have been as regards hitting, and it 

 required a rare good man behind the gun for cartridges to average 

 not more than two per head of game. 



