178 A MONOGRAPH OF THE PHEASANTS ' 



concerned, but it is well to state the fact at once, so that the details of its life 

 history may not be forgotten when we come to compare the feral and the domestic 

 birds, and to attempt to trace the part which the cock and the hen have played in 

 the history of mankind. 



It is difficult to correlate the habits or to present them in a uniform, inclusive 

 summary in the case of a bird such as this, which ranges from the borders of 

 Kashmir to the southern limits of Johore. I met with the Red Junglefowl in many 

 countries and watched it under many varying conditions, and in most cases I have 

 found it necessary to do away with the convenient generalizations which are so 

 easy to make in the case of pheasants of more restricted range, living under more 

 homogeneous ecological conditions. 



I believe the home range of the Junglefowl is of quite limited extent. I have 

 been told by tea-planters of a family of these birds which inhabited a certain bit of 

 bamboo jungle month after month, apparently never leaving it except to make short 

 excursions for water and food. And these sedentary habits are, I believe, more 

 pronounced in this group of birds than in most of the more typical pheasants. 

 During the breeding season the birds which frequent some given area are seldom 

 seen, retiring into the deeper, denser parts of the jungle. But there is no extensive 

 wandering. Where wild birds get into the habit of feeding upon crops, or associating 

 with domestic fowls, they correspondingly limit their home range even more, and 

 when not molested, their comings and goings can be timed as accurately as in the 

 case of the barnyard fowls themselves. 



Taking three thousand feet as an average maximum height, we find the Jungle- 

 fowl living at a comparatively low elevation. The great proportion are not exposed 

 to any but slight changes in annual temperature, and hence have no cause to make 

 even limited seasonal migrations. The birds which range up the valleys and southern 

 slopes of the Himalayas, are found breeding at a maximum height of about five 

 thousand feet, while occasional records show that exceptional individuals may wander 

 upward two thousand feet higher. These, of course, are affected by the approach of 

 cold weather, and as I observed in Garhwal, descend several thousand feet to warmer 

 altitudes, reascending when the warm weather again returns. So we see that with 

 these local exceptions, no regular seasonal migration is to be found among Red 

 Junglefowl. 



While the name Junglefowl is quite correct, bamboo-fowl would be even more 

 appropriate, as they are especially fond of this type of vegetation, and as I look back 

 over my memories of these birds, any visualizing of them is invariably accompanied 

 by a background of the tall, curving stems and the soft foliage of bamboo. 



Rarely I have found them in heavy tropical forest devoid of bamboo, and in 

 the vicinity of the semi-arid plains they must needs be content with the shelter 

 afforded by clumps of acacias and other similar plants. 



Throughout India the Junglefowls live of necessity more or less close to 

 cultivated districts, and indeed, even in the less settled parts of Burma and the 

 Malay States, I found them far more often in the vicinity of native villages than in 

 the trackless depths of the jungle. This fact must be taken into consideration in 

 speaking of their comparative abundance. On the whole Red Junglefowl show a 



