594 MANATID^. 



398. Halicore dugong. The Dugon;/ or Duyong. 



Trichechns dugung, Erxlehen, Syst. Her/. An. p. 599 (1777). 

 Halicore dugono-, Illiger, Prod. p. 140 ; Gray S; Hardw. III. Ind. Zool. 



ii, pi. xxiii ; Blyth, J. A. S. B. xxviii, pp. 271, 483, 494; id. Cat. 



p. 143 ; id. Mam. Birds Burma, p. 53 ; Jerdon, Mam. p. 311 ; 



W. Sclater, Cat. p. 326. 

 Halicore iudicus, Desm. Mam. p. 509; Cantor, J. A. S. B. xv,p. 274 ; 



Kelaart, Prod. p. 89. 



Talla mala, Muda ura, Cing. ; Duyong, Parampuan knit, Malay. 



Colour either bluish grey throughout or the lower parts whitish 

 or white. 



Dimensions. Extreme length of adults 8 to 9 feet, usually 5 to 7 ; 

 much larger dimensious are given in hook^. but are o])en to doubt. 



Fig. 19().- — HaJieovc dtiyony. 



1)1 a large specimen 8 ft. 6 in. long and ('> ft. in circumference, the 

 pectoral fins were 16 inches long and 8 inches broad, and the breadth 

 of the tail from tip to tip 31. The skull of a male from Ceylon 

 measures 14-5 inches in basal length and 8*5 in breadth. 



Distribution. The shores of the Indian Ocean from E. Africa to 

 Australia for about 15 degrees on each side of the Equator. 

 Dugongs have been observed on the coast of Malabar, the north- 

 west coast of Ceylon from the Grulf of Calpentyn to Adam's Bridge, 

 around the Andaman Islands, and in the Mergui Archipelago. 



Habits. Formerly dugongs were said to be found in large herds 

 of some hundreds of individuals, and to be in places so tame as to 

 allow themselves to be handled. As their flesh is by all accounts 

 excellent and their fat yields a clear limpid oil of great value, they 

 have everywhere been hunted and are now in most places rare. 

 They are said to be slow in their movements and unintelligent. 

 Their food consists of marine algae. They haunt shallow bays, 

 salt-water inlets, and mouths of estuaries, but do not, like the 

 Manati, ascend rivers. The female gives birth to but one young 

 at a time, and is said to hold it with her pectoral tin. Some writers 

 have suggested that the dugong has given rise to the myth of the 

 mei'maid (hence, indeed, the name Halicore) ; but it should be re- 

 membered that stories of beings half man or woman, half fish, are 

 as common in temperate as in tropical seas, and tlial some of them 

 are more ancient than any European knowledge of the dugong. 



