MALAYAN CRESTED FIREBACK 



Lophura rvtfa (Raffles) 



Names. — Specific : rufa, from the Latin Tufus, red, with reference to the colour of the fiery back. English : 

 Malayan Crested Fireback ; Vieillot's Fireback. French : Faisan de Vieillot. German : Rothriickenfasan. Native : 

 Pegar, or Ayam Pegar (Malay and Sakai) ; Ayam siul [Whistling fowl] (Malay). 



Brief Description. — Male: General plumage black, glossed with purplish-blue; lower back and rump 

 fiery bronze-red ; feathers of the sides and flanks with white or chestnut shaft-stripes ; middle pairs of tail-feathers 

 white. A tufted crest with long bare shafts. Facial skin and wattles blue ; feet red. Female : Rich chestnut 

 above, faintly mottled with black ; throat white ; breast chestnut edged with white ; remaining under plumage dark 

 brown, widely margined with white. Crest shorter than in male. Facial skin blue ; feet red. 



Range. — From southern Siam and Tenasserim southward ; Malay Peninsula and Sumatra. 



GENERAL ACCOUNT 



This is decidedly a low-country bird, and I doubt if it ever ascends to the higher 

 altitudes of the Malayan or Sumatran mountains. In Siam I know of records only 

 from the extreme south, and it is improbable that it overlaps the range of diardi. Even 

 in the low Malayan coastal country of the west and the central Pahang region drained 

 by the tributaries of the river of the same name, where I have observed this species, 

 its distribution is far from regular. Great stretches which seem eminently suited to 

 its requirements are apparently uninhabited by it, where the natives have no 

 knowledge of the bird. Then again, not far distant, every child will recognize its 

 picture and shout ''Ayam pigar T' and a few days of careful search will reveal 

 traces of a family or flock. Nevertheless, in spite of its comparative abundance in 

 some areas, my search for the Malayan Crested Fireback proved one of the most 

 trying of my experiences with wild pheasants. By the calendar it was still the dry 

 season ; by the rain gauge it was the height of the rainy period. In the open forest 

 where we expected to find this species we neither saw nor heard it. 



Years ago, Malays or Sakais made numerous clearings throughout many parts 

 of the jungle, planted some crop, and then deserted the clearing for another. Many 

 of these were in valleys, close to the bed of small streams. Such places are now 

 covered with a tangle of thorny palms and enmeshed vines, and in these all but 

 impenetrable thickets, the beautiful Crested Fireback elects to spend most of his time. 

 All trace of the former savage cultivator of the soil has vanished — hut, tools and 

 pottery. But now and then, from the heart of some such tangle as I have described, 

 a pair of house crows will fly up croaking hoarsely. Through all the years they or 

 their descendants have clung to this bit of human handiwork, deep in the jungle 

 and far from the haunts of living human beings. They form a parallel to the little 

 Guiana house wrens which one finds still haunting old, long-deserted and overgrown 

 huts in the heart of the British Guiana forest.^ 



1 Beebe, "Our Search for a Wilderness," 1910, p. 307. 



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