MISCELLANEOUS NOTES. 947 



The embargo on the export of the plumes of farm-bred egrets is an anti- 

 quated measure which has outUved its original mison d'etre. It can no lon^sr 

 be justified even for humanitarian reasons. The industry of breeding egrets 

 has been built up in the face of highly adverse conditions. On the other hand 

 the clandestine export of feathers has been proceeding on' an extensive seal; 

 which it does not appear to be possible to suppress and it is important to disting- 

 uish between the export of feathers of farm-bred birds and feathers of slaughter- 

 ed wild birds. 



The system of breeding egrets which has gro»vn up in Sind has now been 

 extended,on information obtained from Sind,to the Punjab and Assam. Plumes 

 are now available in fairly large quantities and espscially prepared aigrettes 

 are being hawked about in the streets of Calcutta and sold at very high prices. 



No. XIV.— SNARTNG QUAIL IN NORTH BEHaR. 



(With a plate.) 



In the Dharbanga District the quail catcher makes use of a slightly diffsrent 

 method to that given by Sterndale and quoted by Hume in his Gam'^ Birds c f 

 India (Vol. II, p. 143). It is probably the method Jerdon writes about as 

 follows : — -" The Nepalese have an ingenious way of catching Quail. They put 

 a pair of imitation horns on their heads, and walk slowly about the stubble fields 

 twisting some blades of grass in their hands in a way to imitate the champing of 

 grass by cattle, and as these birds are not alarmed by cattle, they succeed in 

 driving any quail they see under a small net, which they then drop and secure 

 the bird." This account does not quite correspond with the method employed 

 here. The quail catcher as described by Hume made use of a bullock to drive 

 the birds up to the net and " his traps consisted of a series of rectangular 

 frames, made of laths, about two feet long by one foot broad (a tightly 

 stretched net occupying the interior of each frame) joined at the ends and 

 folding up like a long map. There were about a dozen of these frames and the 

 centre one had an aperture in the net large enough to admit a Partridge." 

 Here the man, as described by Jerdon, is both bullock and snarer and he only 

 uses a single net. 



In this District quail are snared by several castes of people but principally by 

 the mallahs (fishermen) and it is only some of them who go in for it. The bu-ds 

 caught are practically all the Common or Grey Quail (Coturnix communis) with 

 very occasionally a Rain or Black- breasted [Coturnix coromandelica) one or else 

 the Little Button Quail (Turnixdussumieri): although the Indian Button Quail 

 (Turnix t. tanki) is also got here, I have had none brouglit to me by these men. 

 The following is the proportion of each species, out of a total of 128 brought to 

 me by the snarers up to the time of writing :— Grey Quail 120, Black- breasted 

 Quail 1 and Little Button Quail 7. 



In the paddy stubble and where the Khesari (Lathyrus sativus) is small, the 

 snarer only goes after the quail in the early morning and in the evening as these 

 are their feeding times and the birds move about freely then ; but where the 

 Khesari or gram (Cicer arietinum) is higher, he snares till later in the morning, as 

 there the cover is shadier and the birds will scuttle about a bit and are not so 

 frightened of birds of prey as they are in the thinner cover in the late mornnig. 



On reaching the spot he intends to work, the catcher first of all takes a slieet 

 aiid rolls up two corners of it for about six inches, these he ties with a piece of 

 straw or grass to keep them from unrolling ; the rolled up corners are meant to 

 represent a cow's horns ; then he gets two thinnish pieces of bamboo about two 

 feet seven inches long, and about five inches from the ends he ties them together 

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