on Sandgr'ouse.



221



far as possible from each other, not settling down into their final

resting place until it is almost dark. Both parents brood the

young when they are very small.


The extraordinary method employed by the parent Sand-

grouse, of conveying water to their young by saturating the

feathers of their breasts, was first described by me in 1895, and

since by Mr. St. Quintin in his interesting account of the success¬

ful rearing of the Lesser Pintailed Sandgrouse, P. exustics. I have

had the good fortune to see the males of Pterocles arenarius, the

Black-breasted Sandgrouse, and Pteroclurus alchatus , the Greater

Pintailed Sandgrouse getting water for their young in a wild state,

but, had I not seen it administered in confinement, would have

considered them to have been demented birds trying to dust in

mud and water, when unlimited dusting ground surrounded them

on every side. In very waterless districts where the only water

procurable was from deep wells situated at great distances from

one another, this method of procuring water must be most

precarious, for I saw P. arenarius waiting by the wells and going

to the muddy spots where the skins used to be laid before being

loaded on to the camels, and where the water was slopped over

from the troughs where the animals drank. I also saw them fly

over the prickly zareba surrounding the tent-villages, and go to

where there was a soft spot for the same purpose. I did see P.

alchatus actually soaking themselves, they were much wilder,

and also in less arid places, but I repeatedly saw cocks pass over,

their white breasts soaked in mud and water. Doubtless the

whole group of Sandgrouse obtain water in this manner, although

I can only answer for the three species mentioned. In this order it

is invidious to single out one species as being more beautiful than

another, but I should be inclined to think that the Western form

of Pintailed Sandgrouse, Pterochincs pyrenaicus, an intensified

form of P. alchatus to be the most beautiful. It is in this species

that the seasonal changes are so marked. It is impossible to

describe them clearly without a long series of plates, but roughly,

there is the first nestling plumage which is assumed from the

down. This is moulted in the autumn into the winter plumage.

In the very early spring this again is changed into the breeding

plumage, and the cock in the late summer puts on an eclipse



