THE RED JUNGLE-FOWL. 22/ 



The Red Jungle Fowl breeds alike in hills and plains, from 

 almost sea level up to three, four, or even five thousand feet 

 elevation according to locality. 



According to my personal experience in the Himalayas 

 and sub-Himalayan tracts, its eggs are normally only to be 

 found between the 1st April and the end of June, and the 

 higher the nest the later they lay, but others talk of finding 

 the nests in January, February, or March, and I therefore 

 suppose that they lay earlier further south. 



The hen makes her nest in any dense thicket, bamboo clumps, 

 it is said by preference, though I have not noticed this to be 

 the case, composed of dry leaves, grass, and stems of soft her- 

 baceous plants. Sometimes the nest is large and comfortable ; 

 sometimes it looks as if the bird had made no nest and merely 

 laid on a heap of dry leaves that it found handy, hollowing a 

 receptacle for the eggs by the pressure of its body. Sometimes, 

 again, the bird has clearly scraped a hollow in which to place 

 the nest, and sometimes it has scraped up the earth all round, so 

 as to make a sort of rim to the nest and keep the materials firm. 



Many years ago, shooting in May for a month in the 

 Siwaliks, chiefly along the southern side, my people and dogs 

 between them used to find me a nest almost every day, and 

 once we found six within a circle of 200 yards near the Bhinj- 

 ka-khol. A large lota of water was carried, and one or two 

 eggs out of every batch were tested to see if they would lie 

 flat at the bottom, stand on end, or float ; of course we took 

 only the former, and these I used to eat boiled, roast, and in 

 omelettes, until I got perfectly sick of them. In those days, 

 (I say it with pain and humiliation) the only use I ever put 

 eggs to was to eat them, and in this particular case I was 

 punished, for since I took to collecting eggs fate has so willed 

 it that I have never seen a single nest, and have only quite 

 recently succeeded in obtaining a good series from different 

 localities. Well, in all the many nests I have seen, I never 

 found more than nine eggs, and as well as I can remember five 

 or six were the usual complement, even where the eggs were 

 hard-set and floated. Other people speak of finding many more 

 eggs in a nest. Wardlaw Ramsay, for instance, took a nest in 

 Karenee on the 14th March containing eleven eggs ! 



Captain Hutton says : — " The Common Jungle-Fowl is abun- 

 dant in some parts of the Dun, and in summer ascends the outer 

 hills to 5,000 feet elevation. It lays its eggs on the ground 

 with little preparation of nest, contenting itself with scrap- 

 ing together a few dry leaves and grass ; the eggs being from 

 four to six generally, though often more, of a dull white, and 

 very similar to those of Common Bantam Fowls, with which it 

 will readily breed if domesticated from the egg. 



" I have often reared the chicks under a domestic hen and 

 turned them loose, but after staying about the house for several 



