332 JOURNAL, BOMB AY NATURAL HIST. SOCIETY, Vol. XXI. 



guns and beaters, sweeping a large field of this kind into which 

 a flock has been marked, will often account for the whole party 

 flushing them like so many Pheasants out of a dense turnip field, 

 with buckwheat lines, along a cover side." 



Mr. M. M. Currie has sent me the following interesting note 

 on the occurrence of the Houbara in Ludhiana and Dhera Ismail 

 Khan. "Bustard," — i.e., the Lesser Bustard or Obara, commonly- 

 called " Tilvir" in the Punjab, was pretty common in the Dhera 

 Ghazi Khan where I shot a certain number in the cold weather 

 of 1908-09. They were most common in the dry tract at the 

 foot of the Salimans where they seemed to be especially fond 

 of lying up in a kind of coarse grass locally known as Ghamm. 

 Later in the year they haunt the fields sewn with oil-seeds (tara- 

 mira). I have also seen them in the low-lands down by the 

 Indus. The usual number seen together was three or four, but 

 once or twdce I have seen as many as a dozen together. The 

 method of shooting most often employed is with camels. The 

 sportsman dismounts and taking cover behind the camel, continues 

 to approach in circles till wdthin range when he advances towards 

 the spot where the bird is lying till he puts it up. 



" The best bag I ever saw made in this manner was by a com- 

 panion of mine who got six birds one day, whilst I, not so 

 fortunate, shot but one. It is said to be possible at times to walk 

 them up in the oil seeds, but I never did so with any success." 



It is perhaps quite as often hawked as shot, though naturally 

 one does not expect to make as big bags in the former as in the 

 latter way. 



Major Drake Brockman thus describes a day Houbara hawking 

 near Peshawar. 



" Some of the pleasantest days I can remember having passed 

 in India were spent at Peshawar in the cold w^eather of 1893 and 

 1894. 



" Apart from the excellent pack of hounds there and the good 

 sport we had I think that even more pleasant days were those we 

 spent out hawking Houbara on the Jamrud Plain in the company 

 of Mr. Donald, Asst. Commr., and Colonel Aslam Khan, of the 

 Khyber Eifles. 



