312 GAME-BIRDS OF INDIA 



was smashed) in Algeria on the 15th May and finallj-, Tomlinson 

 took eggs near Basra in June, and Pitman and others near Kut in 

 the same month. It seems possible, therefore, that like the 

 Common Indian Sand-Grouse, the eggs may be found in practically 

 any month of the yea^v, provided one knows where to look for them. 

 Captain Pitman informs me that : — 



" They are fairly common and breed round Kut and Sinn, though 

 I was not lucky enough to find any clutch of eggs I could keep and 

 clean. The birds seem to prefer the same bare ground for breeding 

 purposes as that normally frequented by them at other seasons, and 

 which is well away from human habitation. At the end of June 

 I found a clutch of three eggs laid on the ground ; there was no 

 sign of any nest, and the eggs were placed on the bare hard pat ' 

 (dried mud) of a dried up marsh. Unfortunately the eggs were on 

 the point of hatching and it was quite impossible for me to clean 

 them. 



" They were slightly smaller than those of the Large Pintailed 

 Sand-Grouse, though much the same in shape, i.e., elongated ovals. 

 In colour they were a greenish-stone with brownish and reddish 

 spots and blotches, thicker at one end than the other, but 

 nowhere very bold or pronounced, and not very distinguishable 

 from the ground colour." 



Jourdain describes the nest as "a mere scratching in sandy 

 ground in the southern part of the great plain of El Ontaya. Here 

 the plain is practically fiat, and the surface consists, not of loose sand, 

 but of hard sandy soil, more or less broken up by small stones. 

 Here and there is a little vegetation, for the most part small clumps 

 of thyme (?) and other plants, but the eggs are laid in a hollow well 

 away from any protection of this kind. This Grouse was rare here, 

 but far more common further south, about thirty kilometres south- 

 east of Biskra, where small flocks were constantly seen." 



Eggs have also been laid by captive birds in the Giza Zoological 

 Gardens. Dr. Hartert obtained an oviduct-egg in Algeria on the 

 2'2nd April, and Aharoni took a single egg in Mesopotamia on the 

 15th May, 1911, which is now in the Tring Museum. 



The eggs are, of course, the usual cylindrical or elliptical shape 

 common to all sand-grouse, and the texture is also, as usual, fine 

 and smooth, though there is very little gloss in the majority, and 

 in no case is it as highly developed as it is in the eggs of many other 

 species. 



