566 JOURNAL, BOMBAY NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY, Vol, XI, 



■cannot explain. They are not much shot at, as the inhabitants are 

 nearly all fisher people who possess but few guns and who get their duck 

 by driving them into nets and not by shooting them. 



I have never in any part of Bengal known them to be so tame as to 

 require stoning to induce them to leave a tree as Hume says is neces*. 

 ■sary in many parts, yet in liungpur, Furreedpur and some other 

 districts they are so confiding that to get a sitting shot would be a very 

 easy feat were it desirable, and the birds do not. fly until the last 

 moment. They perch ,very freely on trees, even when not in the 

 breeding season, but I think that, as a rule, they rest, when in flocks, 

 ■on the water and not on trees, sometimes of course they do rest during 

 the heat of the day on trees. Hume indeed says generally, and this 

 habit again may be one of locality varying in the different parts it 

 affects. • ; 



At night I think they roost almost invariably on trees, and even 

 where they are shy and wild and feed in the evening and early 

 morning, the middle of the night is probably passed roosting on trees. 

 They very rarely rest on land, as do their larger brethren D.fulva, 

 and I have never personally seen them thus actually on land. The 

 only time I have seen a flock of any size on a tree was once when 

 passing under a huge Banyan tree, a large flock flew out just over- 

 head. I was riding when they started, but I remember that as they 

 departed out of sight, I viewed the last of them from the ground on 1 

 which I was reclining in a' semi-sitting posture. I forget now which 

 got out of sight first, the Teal or my pony, the latter a skittish T. B. 

 Waler. 



Banyan trees are very favourite resorts of this bird, because, doubt- 

 lass, of the large horizontal branches which are so numerous and which 

 give them good foothold without calling on the powers of grasping to: 

 any great extent. They are quick, strong swimmers and very good 

 divers also, but I have not known them dive and remain under water, 

 holding into weeds, etc., as some ducks do. Asa rule, a wounded' 

 bird dives and scurries under water at a great pace. for about ten to 

 twenty yards and then reappears, once more to dive as the would-be 

 catcher thinks that at last he has got it. 



They feed on anything and everything, but bring Up their young 

 principally on animal food, and they themselves, in an adult state,. 



