WILD SHEEP OF ASIA AND AMERICA 267 



The following account of the habits of urial is 

 given by Dr. Blanford : ^ — 



"In Ladak this sheep inhabits open valleys; 

 in Astor and Gilgit it keeps to grassy ground at 

 moderate elevations below the forest ; in the Salt 

 Range of the Punjab, and in Sind, Baluchistan, 

 and Persia, it is found on undulating or hilly 

 ground cut up by ravines, and is more often seen on 

 stony and rocky hill-sides than amongst bushes and 

 scrub. The herds vary usually from three or four to 

 twenty or thirty in number ; the sexes are generally 

 together, but the males often keep apart in summer. 

 These sheep are wary and active ; although not 

 such masters of the art of climbing amongst preci- 

 pices as the goats, tahr, or bharal, they get over 

 steep places with wonderful ease. Their alarm-cry 

 is a shrill whistle, their usual call a kind of bleat. 



" The rutting-season in the Punjab is September. 

 According to Adams the period of gestation is seven 

 months, but according to Sclater, from observations 

 in the Zoological Gardens in London, only four. 

 It is not improbable that the true period is between 

 the two. The young in Astor are produced about 

 the beginning of June, and the rutting-season there 

 must be considerably later than September. One 

 or two young are born. This species has bred 

 freely with tame sheep." 



The last statement is of importance in connec- 



' op. cit., p. 499. 



