HIMALAYAN IMPEYAN PHEASANT 123 



My battery of binoculars was soon mounted and I settled myself for a long vigil. A 

 pair of lammergeiers came down to investigate, but sheered off after a keen scrutiny 

 of their supposed prey. My only other visitor was a little creeper which hitched 

 up and over the rock and mounted one of my hunting-boots before he realized that 

 I was some fearful creature, not a part of the boulder, and dropped from view in 

 voiceless terror over the rim of the precipice near by. My attention wandered from 

 my main object, and when I again looked through my glasses I saw an Impeyan — a 

 cock not yet in full plumage — squatted on the shelf. Soon two other apparently full- 

 plumaged cocks flew up from the meadow, reaching the shelf with a single, direct, 

 almost vertical flight from the ground. These birds moved scarcely a feather after they 

 reached the shelf, squatting at once but with eyes wide open, and, until dusk obscured 

 their forms, they showed no signs of sleep nor yet of movement. I slipped down from 

 my perch and went back to camp. On the following night none came to the roost — 

 at least until darkness put a stop to my watching, and on the succeeding evening the 

 two cocks were alone. This was my last opportunity, and I was unable to learn whether 

 the young bird would be seen again or not. I was especially sorry for this, as the next 

 day a Nepalese shepherd passed me with a dead immature cock Impeyan which he had 

 snared two valleys away. At this meeting he was suspicious of me, and I could not 

 persuade him to sell me the bird. It seems hardly likely that this bird would have 

 wandered a full five miles from its roosting place, so I have no doubt the birds were 

 really two individuals. 



The chief point of interest to me in this roost was the fact of the sound sense 

 showed in choosing such a location. Beech martens and grey foxes were abundant 

 and wild dogs were about, while doubtless other terrestrial carnivores of which we 

 knew nothing were in the vicinity — all potentially impeyanivorous. But here, sheltered 

 from all the worst storms, these birds had found a truly impregnable sleeping place. 

 The darkness of night made all safe from soaring eagles, and the scant ten or fifteen 

 feet of vertical rock between the ledge and the turf was a barrier which no four-footed 

 foe might scale. But here again, most careful search failed to reveal the roosting place 

 of any female Impeyans. Nesting was just about to commence. 



Although Impeyans seem to tolerate one another's presence more or less throughout 

 the year, I have never seen or heard of their associating closely with any other species 

 of bird. They have often been found feeding in company with some of the Himalayan 

 ungulates, and in certain places, especially in the western Himalayas, they prove a source 

 of annoyance to sportsmen who are after tahr or goral. If the keen eyes of an old cock 

 Impeyan once spy out the stalking hunter, the loud whistle of alarm is almost certain 

 to arouse the suspicions of every tahr within earshot, and to make them restless and 

 uneasy and almost impossible to approach. From the very first of my pheasant 

 researches I had in my mind many possible inter-relations of interest — both friendly 

 and inimical — which might exist between these birds and their neighbours, and in a 

 number of species I found abundant reward in this particular respect for my many hours 

 of observation, but with the Impeyans I failed to find any reciprocal associations such 

 as that between certain kalij pheasants and small mammals. 



As to the enemies of Impeyans we have more exact information. From the time 

 when first womankind looked on the marvellous plumage of this bird and pronounced 



