Jottings on common Indian Birds.



255



names are made out without regard to the correct sequence or

affinity of species, and are only meant to show Aviculturists what

lies in store for them if they ever venture on a journey to what I

consider the richest and most beautiful country in South America :—

Birds of prey, 8 ; Cardinals, 2 ; Curassows, 3 ; Ducks, 3 ; Finches

and Sparrows, 17 ; Grosbaeks, 2 ; Goose, l; Guans, 2 ; Herons, 4 ;

Hang-nests, 9 ; Humming Birds, 8 ; Jays, 3 ; Owls, 2 ; Parrots, etc.,

5 ; Pigeons and Doves, 8 ; Saltator. 2 ; Sugar Birds, 3 ; Sun Bittern,

1; sundries, 3 : Siskins, 3 ; Tanagers, 21; Thrushes, 4 ; Toucans, 4 ;

Vultures, 4; Waders, 6; Woodpeckers, 2.



JOTTINGS ON COMMON INDIAN BIRDS.


By Aubyn Trevor-Battye.


(Concluded from page 218 ).


Those who have seen Mr. Stuart Baker’s book will see how

many and varied are the Pigeons and Doves of India; but easy

as we find it to identify all our birds of this Order on the wing, it is

a very different matter when it is a case of birds with which one is

not familiar, and both Pigeons and Doves are far more often noticed

when flying than when at rest. I think the Green Pigeon seen so

often in Ceylon, when it will fly in front of a motor car, often settling

and then rising again as the car gets nearer, is the Southern Green

Pigeon (Crocopus chlorog aster), and the one that behaved in exactly

the same way in front of my pony in Sikham may perhaps have

been the Bengal Green Pigeon ( C. plncenicopterus), though Sikhim

seems rather high for its range as given by Blanford. The Indian

Blue Eock-Pigeon (Columba intermedia) was to be seen in every

place visited in India proper. In Eajputana it really swarms and

no one ever touches it ; one sees it in the towns and in great flocks

close to the fields. A delightful and confiding bird in gardens and

generally about towns and villages is the Little Brown Dove ( Turtur

cambay ensis).


A neighbour of mine has a Peacock (I, too, would have one

also, or several, if they would leave my flowers alone) and his voice

comes over the hanger, across the meadow land, and up to our hill.



