THE GAME BIRDS OF INDIA, BURMA AND CEYLON. 321 



combined with its open habitat may enable it to survive any 

 persecution it has, or may have, to endure. At the same time the 

 Great Indian Bustard requires protection just as much as our 

 other Game birds do, for it is much sought after by snarers and 

 bird catchers. I have had several letters from correspondents 

 describing the way these birds are noosed in all districts and 

 all Provinces. The principal way in which they are caught is 

 that described by Hume, who writes " In parts of the 

 Punjab, and doubtless elsewhere, the native fowlers are very 

 expert in noosing them. A small party is described in the middle 

 of a plain. The fowler, with a blanket folded over head and 

 shoulders, native fashion, (or at times driving a trained bullock 

 before him) and a large supply of pegs and gut nooses at his 

 girdle, circles slowly approaching nearer and nearer, round the 

 ilock. By little indications inappreciable to us, he discovers the 

 directions in which if slightly and cautiously pressed, the Bustards 

 will walk. Across the line of march, sauntering slowly backwards 

 and forwards, and pretending to cut and collect grass the while, 

 the fowler pegs down rows of nooses. Then, taking a wider 

 circuit, he begins to approach the flock from the opposite side not 

 walking at them, but sideways, at right angles to the line he 

 wishes them to take, passing nearer and nearer at each lap, never 

 in the least alarming them, but quietly edging and pressing them 

 towards the nooses. Sometimes he lets them walk right on to the 

 nooses ; generally when close to them, he drops his blanket, throws 

 up his arms, and rushes at them. They always in these cases run 

 a few paces before they rise, and though occasionally all escape, 

 generally one, often two, and sometimes three or four, are caught 

 by one or other leg. The chief skill consists in walking them 

 exactly across the lines of nooses, which are never, according to 

 nxj experience, more than fifty yards long, and usually much less." 



As will be seen by Jerdon's description this bird is practically 

 omnivorous ; but to the items of diet mentioned by him must be 

 added rats, mice and similar small animals, young birds and much 

 vegetable matter, such as the shoots of young mustard, young 

 wheat, lemon grass, etc. 



Two or three writers to me have mentioned this Bustard's 



