EASTERN STOCK-PIGEON 151 
pepul trees. To Europeans here (in Hansi) they are known as the 
Hill-Pigeons. They are probably migratory in India, breeding in Central 
Asia. Buchanan Hamilton, however, states that a wild Blue-Pigeon 
breeds in Goruckpore in plantations, and is a great consumer of grain. He 
however considered it the ‘ same as one that breeds on rocks on the banks 
of the Jumna and other places,’ ie. the Common Blue Rock-Pigeon.”’ 
They are grain, seed, berry and fruit-eaters, under normal circum- 
stances living principally on the latter and various seeds and nuts of 
trees, but greedily attacking ripe and ripening crops when in the 
vicinity of civilization. Whitehead found them when in Kohat in the 
latter half of April feeding principally on the mulberries which were 
ripening. He also states that he found them less wary than other 
members of the same family. In the Kurram Valley he found it 
scarce, and only passing through on migration. A specimen shot by him 
on the 2nd of May, at an elevation of 6,500 ft., was killed in Ilex-scrub. 
Reid found that they roosted during the heat of the day, and also 
at night, in the mango groves, and if they were not molested would 
keep to the same grove for days and even weeks together. 
Major J. Lindsay-Smith informs me that he has noticed that the 
bird has a curious predilection for roosting near water. At Lyallpur, 
during the cold weather, he found them roosting in very great num- 
bers—often hundreds—in the dead trees by the two great canal reservoirs, 
the Rodo-koru and the Sonari. Here, where the overflow water periodically 
escapes from the canal over a considerable area, the trees stand, withered 
skeletons, in a waste of water some four feet deep, and Major Lindsay 
Smith informs me that he has seen some of these trees black with the 
birds roosting on them. At and about Mooltan he also noticed that 
the birds always seemed to select trees along the banks of the Chenab 
for roosting purposes, both by night and during the heat of the day. 
The number in which these birds collect in these roosting-trees 
may be imagined when one shot is capable of bringing down fourteen 
birds, an experience which happened to a Mr. E. P. Ussher, when shooting 
on the banks of the same Chenab above referred to. 
Mr. Ussher informs me that he found them very confiding birds 
on their first arrival into the country, but they soon became very wary 
and wild after they had been shot at for a day or two. 
In flight and voice they resemble exactly the eastern Stock-Dove, 
and for the table they are equally good. 
