THE BIRDS OF NORTH KAN ABA. 653 



shore. The Ghats, which are from two to three thousand feet high, are 

 almost entirely clothed with forest mainly evergreen, and do not show 

 the precipitous cliffs seen in the neighbourhood of Bombay. 



The above-Ghat portion consists of the divisions of Supa, Yellapur, 

 Sirsi, and Sidclapur in the centre, with the divisions of Halyal and 

 Mundgode in the extreme North-east adjoining Dharwar. The forest 

 in this is mainly deciduous, but especially in the South contains large 

 patches of evergreens called by the inhabitants " kans." 



In the East portion of Sirsi and Siddapur, and generally in Halyal 

 and Mundgode, there is much cultivation, mainly rice, but an occa- 

 sional field of gram or millet is grown. In the West of Sirsi and 

 Siddapur and throughout Yellapur there are large and valuable spice 

 gardens with their auxiliary " betta" lands covered with pollarded trees 

 for supplying leaf manure. There are also numerous scattered rice 

 fields, mostly however waste, as the climate is so bad that the cultivators 

 find it impossible to get labour to cultivate them, though many retain 

 the fields in hopes of better days, and unwilling to have Government 

 land in the midst of their properties, paying the rents of the rice fields 

 from the profits of their gardens. 



The West of Halyal and the East of Supa consists of magnificent 

 teak jungle intermixed as are most of the other forests with bamboo, 

 while the rest of Supa is mainly covered with almost worthless scrub, 

 and the Mahrattee cultivators who inhabit it live a hard life working at 

 small patches of rice, and eking out the proceeds by such labour as is 

 available. 



The rainfall of course varies much ; on the Coast it is generally from a 

 hundred to two hundred inches ; the southern portion having the heaviest 

 fall. Along the ridge of the Ghats, judging from the rain-gauge 

 returns at Castle Rock where the Southern Mahratta Railway pierces 

 the Ghats, it is probably seldom much under three hundred inches. 



A hundred inches is about the average at Sirsi and Sidclapur, while 

 in the East at Halyal and Mundgode, it diminishes to some forty inches. 



Such a varied country naturally produces much variety in its avi- 

 fauna, and several birds found there commonly appear elsewhere in the 

 Presidency only as stragglers. 



Heavy forests are however bad ground for finding nests, and even 

 for collecting the birds themselves, and no doubt there are a good 



