196 A MONOGRAPH OF THE PHEASANTS 



while the evils of inbreeding are banished. One sees traces of long-tailed-fowl blood 

 even in the fowls of Kagoshima, where I saw many cocks walking about whose 

 tail-coverts were so long as to drag for several inches on the groundf 



In the Malay States most of the aborigines, even the small nomadic tribes, keep 

 domestic fowls, which they breed and eat. They also occasionally have captive pheasants, 

 but do not eat these, but keep them for barter with the Malays. Any wild Junglefowl, 

 however, which they happen to shoot or snare they consider good food. The usual 

 method of trapping of these natives is to place numerous nooses woven of hair or 

 vegetable fibre on the ground and bait the place with grain. 



Another way which I observed at Kuala Tembeling is by means of an ayam dendk 

 or decoy bird, usually a hybrid cock or hen tethered near the traps or snares. This same 

 method is used elsewhere in Assam, Siam and the Sundarbans. An open space near 

 the forest is usually selected, the decoy bird tied to a stake and surrounded with open 

 nooses and scattered grain. The challenge of the tame bird, which is trained to call often 

 and loudly, attracts the wild cocks, who rush up to give battle, when they are almost 

 certain to become entangled. Or if a hen approaches, she is attracted by the grain and 

 also falls a victim. In Celebes the decoy fowl is called wawansal in the language of the 

 Alfaros, and to catch a Junglefowl in this manner is called mawansal. The natives of 

 this island do not attempt to tame the wild-caught birds, but use them only as food. 



Still another variation of the decoy trapping is practised in Sulu, where the domestic 

 bird is tethered in the centre of a circle of spring nooses. Many wild birds are thus 

 captured, but only cocks. Even where grain is added to the charm of the calling bird, 

 the females remain aloof. 



In northern Burma the bamboo fence traps, with their scores of deadfalls, account 

 for many hundreds of Junglefowl in the course of a year. In other places I have seen 

 separate nooses set for these birds, each attached to a bent sapling and baited with 

 grain. 



Besides using decoy birds the Malays imitate the crowing and the flapping of the 

 wings of the Junglecocks, and they taught me so that several times I was able to 

 inveigle the birds close to me by making them think that a challenging bird was 

 concealed in my cover. 



It is difficult to say whether Junglefowl in general are decreasing or are at least 

 holding their own. If we consider only the isolated, really pure strains, they are 

 unquestionably becoming fewer in numbers, but those which haunt the vicinity of 

 villages and cultivated districts, although shot frequently and suffering from the many 

 enemies, such as snakes and small carnivores, which make life a burden for the village 

 fowl in India, yet are constantly gaining recruits from the ranks of the domestic birds. 



In the reserved forests in the sub-Himalayan region the birds seem to be fully 

 holding their own, as there is little shooting there and the native foresters have little 

 time for snaring and trapping. In these Government Reserves the birds are protected 

 from all shooting from the first day of March to the middle of September. The most 

 common time for Junglefowl drives either on foot or from elephants is from November i 

 to the end of February. 



To the southward, in the Central Provinces of India, the close season for this 

 species is from March i to November 30. 



