Turnix joudera, Hodgson. 



Vernacular Nam©S.— [ Lowa, Upper India ; Pedda dubba giindlu (Telegu) ; ] 



LITTLE skulking thinly-distributed species, rarely seen, 

 and still more rarely shot, our information as to its 

 distribution is very meagre. Jerdon says it occurs in 

 the upland districts of Malabar, and Mr. F. Bourdillon 

 sent me a skin from South Travancore, but I have no 

 other records of its occurrence so far south. I do 

 not know of its occurring in Ceylon or in any part of 

 the Peninsula south of the latitude of Madras, save only in 

 Travancore and Malabar, as above. It has not been reported 

 from Mysore. It is very rare in the Deccan, and neither Sykes, 

 Fairbank, Davidson nor Wenden appear ever to have met with it ; 

 but Captain Butler has shot it in the neighbourhood of Poona dur- 

 ing the rains. Jerdon says it occurs in the Eastern Ghats. Beyond 

 this I regret to say I have no authentic record of its occurrence 

 south of a line drawn from Ganjam to Bombay. North of that it 

 is generally, but usually sparingly, distributed in Orissa, the Tribu- 

 tary Mehals, the Central Provinces, the Central India Agency, 

 Khandesh, the Panch Mahals, and Guzerat, throughout Chota Nag- 

 pore, Bengal,* west of the Brahmaputra, and the North-Western 

 Provinces and Oudh, penetrating during the summer into the 

 warmer valleys of the outer ranges of the Himalayas, and being 

 found up to elevations of 3,000, to 4,500 feet in Sikhim, Nepal, 

 and Kumaun. Whether it extends westwards of this in the 

 Himalayas, I do not know. 



It occurs, but very thinly and locally distributed and only, I 

 think, as a rainy season visitant, in the less arid portions of 

 the Punjab, south and east of the Chenab, of Rajputana, Sind, 

 Cis-Indus, of Cutch and Kathiawar. 



Whether it extends eastwards of the Brahmaputra or up into 

 the valley of Assam, I cannot say. Major Godwin-Austen 

 records it from the Naga Hills, but very possibly his bird may 

 have been macnlosiis, as the Hill Tipperah bird certainly is. 



This is I feel a very vague and unsatisfactory account of the 

 distribution of this species, but materials are wanting, and 



* " Seen in the cold weather occasionally in Jessoie" — H. J. Rainey, 



