THE KYAH OR SWAMP PARTRIDGE, 6 1 



Grass Chukor betakes itself to the fields, hedgerows, and bush 

 jungle, and at this time affords good sport even to the sportsman 

 on foot ; and that in some localities, when flooded, the ' kyah' 

 may be seen flying from tree to tree. Never having visited the 

 birds' haunts during the rains, I have never seen it driven to 

 such insessorial habits, but I know they will occasionally, when 

 calling, perch a little way off the ground on the stalks of reeds 

 and sometimes on a small bush. Like the Grey Partridge, the 

 ' kyah' is a very pugnacious bird. A writer in the above-named 

 Magazine says that almost every one examined will be found 

 scarred and marked with wounds from fighting. It is said also 

 to drive off the Black Partridge if it comes across it ; but this, 

 as far as my experience goes, I have not found to be the case, 

 as I have several times come upon them in the same covert, 

 and remember one day at Pyntee beating a patch of grass and 

 making up a tolerably heavy bag out of it with birds of both 

 species, flushed indiscriminately, and in a manner which showed 

 they must have been feeding or reposing very near each other. 



" For the table the ' khyr' or ' kyah' is not in much repute 

 amongst the very few who are acquainted with its flavour. 

 The young, like the young of the Grey Partridge, are tolerably 

 good, but old ones are dry and hard. However, the writer in 

 the Bengal Sporting Magazine, already quoted, eulogises the 

 bird as ' bearing the palm for delicacy of flavour and texture in the 

 meat of all the game birds of India !' ' During the months of 

 November and December,' continues he, ' it forms an unri- 

 valled dish for the epicure in gamey flavour, and an additional 

 inducement to sportsman to fag and find.' I suspect the fag- 

 ging and finding are very necessary ingredients to furnish that 

 renowned sauce of Spartan origin, without which the - khyr' 

 would be little esteemed." 



Mr. Cripps writes to me : — 



" In the Dacca and Sylhet districts, where I have seen 

 this species, it was a permanent resident and tolerably 

 common. Swampy, or at any rate damp, ground, covered 

 with long grass, brushwood and reeds, is its favourite resort. 

 Along the banks of the ' Kusiyara' River, in Sylhet, I often used 

 to shoot it ; the banks are covered with long grass and brush- 

 wood, intersected by small Ma/s, and boasting, at intervals, of 

 occasional patches of mustard or pulse. In the mornings and 

 evenings the birds used to be found on the outskirts of these 

 cultivated patches ; on the least alarm they sneak into the 

 jungles. Very careful stalking is required to ensure a shot. 

 One of the number is always posted as a sentinel on the top 

 of some bush. The plan I found to succeed best was to beat 

 the jungle, and, whenever a bird was flushed, to mark it down and 

 then beat carefully up to where it had alighted ; it would then 

 rise within easy range, whereas, if any shot offering is taken, the 

 chances are that you miss and frighten the birds, so that they will 



