322 JO VENAL, BOMB A Y NA TURAL HISTOR Y SOCIETY, Vol. IX. 



THE OORIAL. 



By J. D. Inverarity. 



(With a Plate.) 



{Read before the Bombay Natural History Society on 

 28th January, 1895.) 



My experience of this sbeep is confined to the range of hills that 

 divide Sind from Beluchistan, where it is fairly numerous on the lower 

 slopes of the Khirtar Range and in the low stony hills that lie at the 

 foot of, and run parallel to, the main hills. Where I shot them in 

 Sind was from a few hundred feet to about 2,000 feet above sea-level. 

 They are no doubt to be found at higher altitudes, as the hills extend 

 to about 7,000 feet in height, but as one camps near the water at the 

 foot of the hills, I never managed to get any higher than 2,000 feet. 

 I generally kept to the low hills, as the stalking there was easier. The 

 Sind Oorial is the same animal as is found in the salt hills of the Pun- 

 jab, and used to rejoice in the name of Ovis cycloceros. Mr. Blanford, 

 however, in the " Fauna of India (Mammalia) " considers it to be the 

 same as the climatic variety known as Ovis vignei which inhabits the 

 Himalayas, at an elevation of 1 5,000 feet. The differences or sup- 

 posed differences between the two are set forth in the Badminton 

 Library volume on Indian Game. The Sind name for the Oorial is 

 " Gud." It is usually shot in Sind by driving the hills, but the best 

 sport is to stalk it. It would be a fairly easy animal to stalk if it 

 were not that the ground one has to get over is a mass of loose stones, 

 which grate horribly against each other as you tread on them and 

 slip away and roll down the hillside. The lower hills are of conical 

 shape with steep sides covered with loose stone. There are a good many 

 lumps of petrified wood in places and fossil shells. Here you see the 

 Seesee partridge running about among the rocks, while overhead high 

 in the air, in the month of October, are long flights of the " Cullum" on 

 their annual migration to India. The best herd of Oorial I saw num- 

 bered fifteen with three good rams. I had carefully examined the slope 

 of the opposite hill, 400 yards off, without seeing anything. I showed 

 myself over the ridge and up got the herd from the hillside where 

 they had been sitting undistinguishable by me, or my Beluchees, 

 from the surrounding rocks. On another occasion I saw a fine ram 



