350 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol XL 



for our Indian farm. Hume's distribution given in " Game Birds" 

 applies, of course, to both species, and has to be greatly curtailed in its 

 limits outside India. 



It is found throughout Northern India, but is far more numerous to 

 the west than to the east; it extends right away throughout China-, 

 but as most of the birds are recorded as A. cinereus it is difficult to say 

 what notes apply to the true A. cinereus and what to our A. ruhfirostris $ 

 though the probability is that nearly all the Asiatic birds are the 

 latter. It occurs in some numbers throughout Assam, but certainly i» 

 not a very common bird anywhere in that Province, as far as I can 

 ascertain ; Mr. Eden, however^ says that it occurs in great numbers in 

 Sylhet in a favourable year. Probably it is in great numbers- only when 

 compared to the few found of other species. Strange to say there 

 seems to be no record of its having ever appeared in Burma, though iis 

 surely must turn up occasionally in the Northern States-. Mr. Damant 

 reports it to be common in Manipur, next door to Burma, I have* 

 shot one or two pairs in the SunderbundSj but have seen very few birds 

 indeed in that part of the country, and,. I think, east of Calcutta it is- 

 decidedly rare; indeed it is not eommon even in the Calcutta markets^ 

 which are a veritable bird mine for the ornithologist in the right season,, 

 when the rarest edible birds sometimes put in an appearance. In Assam, 

 except in the Brahmaputra and the larger rivers, such as the Surma y 

 etc., it goes about in only small parties of some ten or a dozen, but 

 Grippe met with it in Dacca on the Megna in a flock numbering 

 about 200. This was the only time he noticed the Grey Lag in 

 Dacca. As one wanders further west the flocks become more and 

 more numerous, until in the Western Provinces sportsmen speak 

 of flocks numbering their hundreds which run into thousands* 

 It is a bird of all elevations and is very common in Cashmere 

 in winter and in other similar suitable places up to six thousand 

 feet or more. 



" A Member of the Society" states that no geese are found in the. 

 Konkan, Deccan or Khandeish, but he records an Anser, by which he 

 must refer to the present species, from Gujurat ; here, he says, that it is- 

 not common, but others have obtained them in great numbers. Hume 

 mentions having found flocks numbering fully J, 200, and, I believe, 

 refers to the flocks he saw in Sind* 



