66 INDIAN" DUCKS. 



They breed throughout Asiatic Siberia, in Turkestan. Kashgar. probabl y 

 Northern Persia, and on the Yangtse-Kiang, on which river young birds 

 have been taken. I can find no full description of their breeding-habits, 

 but they are not likely to differ in any way from those of A. cincren^, the 

 European Grey Lag, which lays from -4 to G eggs (according to Oates, 

 <) to 12. or even l-i) in a rough, rather loosely-buih. nest of reeds, rushes, 

 and grass, placed on the ground not far from water. Prjevalsky records 

 l)reeding-places in S.E. Mongolia, the upper valley of the Huanyho, and in 

 Lake Kokonoor. all of wliich places refer to the Asiatic form of the Grey Lag. 

 All notices referring to Europe and North Africa must be taken as being 

 of the true Grey Lag. -1. fine reus, and I fancy that the majority of those 

 in Asia Minor, if not all. will be found to be of the same. 



Thev generallv arrive in India in C)ctober. but do not <iet far south or 

 oast until the end of Xovember : about Calcutta and east of that they appear 

 to come in in early and middle December. C)f course everywhere they 

 sometimes come in much earlier, and they have been recorded in the 

 north-west in September. In the same way. though they all have left India, 

 as a rule, by the end of March, yet sometimes they stay far later : for 

 instance, only lately, in the Bombay N. H. S. Journal, Colonel Unwin has 

 reported receiving four '• Grey Lag Geese " (^-i. cinereus^ as late as the 

 2nd May in Cashmere. It will be interesting, as he says, to see if they do 

 .stay and breed : but I am afraid that there is little chance of it, as their 

 breeding-haunts are not far off, and they are sure to return there. Adams 

 did state that they bred in Ladakh, but his remarks have never been con- 

 firmed, and it seems he must have been mistaken. 



After Hume's long notes on shooting geese given in ' Game-Birds ' it 

 is very difficult to say anything more of any interest. As every sportsman 

 knows, they are shy, wild birds, and ditficult to bring to bag : but their 

 wildness varies much, according to how much the localities in which they 

 reside are shot over. Where many of the natives have guns, and there 

 are also many European sportsmen, the Grey Lag, and every other kind 

 of goose, is an object as worthy of a stalk as any black buck. In such 

 places, it is little use going out to collect a l)ag of geese unless one has 

 really made up his mind to -work the business out proj^erly. If there are 

 any young crops of wheat, kc, in the district the sportsman should be out 

 before daybreak, and he then may, by a careful crawl through grass and 

 wheat, wet with dew -ind very cold — it can be cold t^ven in India, — get 

 within easy shot of tlie birds as thev feed on the voung growth. If wise, 

 he will blaze one barrel into the brown as thev feed and get what he can 



