RHINOCHETIDAE 263 



where the crops are low, yet sometimes they choose more bushy 

 flats, or stony tops of elevated ridges. Their flight is prolonged 

 and often rapid, though invariably heavy, the neck and legs being 

 outstretched ; the Great Bustard rises from the ground slowly, 

 the Little Bustard with a rattling noise, but they are frequently 

 loth to leave it, crouching to escape detection on the similarly 

 coloured soil. They stalk about rapidly and run with ease, being 

 shy, wary, and far-sighted, while they are more easy to approach 

 when they resort to water. The quill-feathers are said to be lost 

 after breeding.'- In spring the pugnacious cocks strut around the 

 hens, swell out and partially reverse their plumage, and inflate 

 the gular pouch ; the head meanwhile is thrown backwards, the 

 wings droop, the tail is usually erected and outspread, and boom- 

 ing or crooning utterances with leaps diversify the performance. 

 At times the notes are described as scolding, drumming, craking, 

 and clucking, or resemble " cok-cok " or " prut-prut." The diet 

 consists chiefly of juicy plants, such as young corn and turnips, 

 clover and plantains, but it includes berries and seeds, insects and 

 their larvae, molluscs, myriapods, frogs, or even small reptiles and 

 mammals. The Gom-Paauw " (Supodotis kori) is so-called from its 

 love of mimosa gum. The eggs, varying from two to four or five 

 in different species, are deposited in an excavation in the soil — 

 sometimes lined with grass — under shelter of a bush, tussock, or 

 growing crop ; they are oily-green, olive, drab, red-brown, or ex- 

 ceptionally bluish-green, and are generally blotched, clouded, or 

 zoned with purplish or dull red. The hen sits very closely. 

 Bustards can be circumvented by riding round them in constantly 

 diminishing circles, and they are also captured with Falcons.^ 



A fossil Otis is recorded from the Miocene of France and 

 Germany. 



Fam. VII. Rhinochetidae. — This contains only one species, 

 Bhinochetus jubahos, the Kagu of New Caledonia, a very old and 

 generalized form, somewhat bigger than an ordinary fowl, which 

 was originally referred to the Herons and then to the Cranes, but 

 is undoubtedly nearly allied to the latter, and approximates rather 

 closely to Eurypyga} The head and eyes are large ; the neck is 



' Chapman and Buck, Wild Spain, London, 1893, p. 342. 

 ^ The Boers of South Africa term all Bustards Paauw, i.e. Peacock (Pavo). 

 ^ Dresser, Birds of EuroiK, vii. 1871-81, pr- 388, 394. 



" "W. K. Parker, Tr. Zool. Soc. London, vi. p. 501 ; x. p. 307 ; Muiie, op. cit. 

 vii. p. 465 ; A. D. Bartlett, P. Z. S. 1862, p. 218. 



