Which is the most difficult bird to shoot? You may put this question to a
dozen sportsmen; probably no two will name the same bird, and each will
be able to give excellent reasons why the particular fowl he mentions is
the hardest to hit. The reason for this diversity of opinion is simply
that there exists no bird more difficult to shoot than all others. Even
as beauty is said to be in the eye of the beholder, so does the
difficulty, or otherwise, of shooting any particular species depend upon
the idiosyncrasies of the would-be slayer. To some shooters all birds,
with the possible exception of the coot, are difficult to bring down,
while others are able to make every flying thing appear an easy mark.
To my way of thinking the chukor (_Caccabis chucar_) takes a lot of
hitting, but this species receives much help on account of its
mountainous habitat. It is difficult to hit even a hoary old peacock if
the bird gets up when you, already pumped to exhaustion by a stiff climb,
are engaged in scrambling from one terraced field to another with your
gun at “safe.” The chukor, thanks to the fact, conclusively proved by our
friend Euclid, that any two sides of a triangle are greater than the
third, enjoys so great an advantage over the wingless _shikari_ that it
would be a contemptible creature were it not difficult to shoot. Were I
the leader of a covey of chukor, I should thoroughly enjoy an attempt to
shoot me. Having taken up a strategic position near the summit of a steep
hill, I should squat there in full view until the sportsman had by
laborious effort climbed to a spot some hundred and twenty yards from
where I was sitting; I should then gracefully retire with my retinue
across the _khud_ to the opposite hill, and watch with interest the
shooter clamber down one limb of an isosceles triangle and swarm up the
other. Some time before he had completed the operation I should again
proceed to give him a practical demonstration of the fact that the base
of certain triangles is considerably shorter than the sum of the other
two sides.
[Illustration: LOTEN’S SUNBIRD (HEN) ABOUT TO ENTER NEST]
If you take away from the chukor his natural advantages I am inclined to
think that the grey partridge (_Francolinus pondicerianus_) is the more
difficult bird to shoot. This species is common in most parts of India,
yet I do not remember ever having heard of any one making a big bag of
grey partridge. Some there are who say that the bird is not worth
shooting. If these good folk mean that the shooting of the partridge
involves so large an expenditure of ammunition as to deter them from the
undertaking I am inclined to agree with them. Given a fair field in the
shape of a plain well studded with prickly pear, there is, in my opinion,
no bird more difficult to hit than the grey partridge. It is, like all
game birds proper, a very rapid flier for a short distance. But it is not
so much this which makes it hard to shoot as the rapidity with which it
can run along the ground and the close manner in which it lies up.
According to Mr. Lockwood Kipling, the grey partridge, as it runs,
“suggests a graceful girl tripping along with a full skirt well held up.”
In a sense the simile is a good one, for the lower plumage of the
partridge is curiously “full,” and so does make the bird look as though
it were holding up its skirts. But until graceful young ladies are able
to gather up their ample skirts and sprint the “hundred” two or three
yards inside “level time,” it will be inaccurate to compare the tripping
gait of the one to the speedy motion of the other. The grey partridge is
a winged sprinter, a feathered Camilla. It can for a short distance hold
its own comfortably against a galloping horse. Frequently have I come
upon a covey, feeding in the open and giving vent to the familiar call,
and have immediately proceeded to stalk it in the hopes of obtaining a
couple of good shots. Before getting within range, one of the birds
invariably “spots” me and gives the alarm. The calling immediately ceases
and the partridges walk briskly to cover. The instant they disappear I
dash towards the cover, hoping to surprise and flush them, but they run
three yards to my two, and by the time I reach the bushes into which they
betook themselves they are laughing at me from afar.
Then the way in which a partridge will sometimes lie up in comparatively
thin cover is remarkable. One day, when shooting snipe at sunrise, I
surprised a partridge feeding in a field. I fired, but apparently did not
hit the bird, for it disappeared into a clump of palm trees and prickly
pear. Taking up a position close to this clump, I instructed my beaters
to throw stones into it. This they did, but half a dozen stones, to say
nothing of as many chunks of clay and the most frantic yells and shouts,
elicited no response from the partridge. I therefore moved on, and the
moment I had turned my back on the clump the bird flew out! This is
typical of my experience as a partridge shooter; the birds almost
invariably get up from cover at a moment when I cannot possibly take a
shot at them. Well might I sing with Cowper—
I stride o’er the stubble each day with my gun
Never ready to shoot till the covey is flown.
For these reasons partridge shooting is to me a particularly exasperating
form of sport. There are few things more annoying than to hear—“the
partridge burst away on whirring wings,” from a bush on which you have
just turned your back after having thrown into it half the contents of a
ploughed field!
I am not a bloodthirsty individual, and enjoy watching birds through a
field-glass quite as much as, if not more than, shooting them with a gun,
but there is something in the call of the grey partridge which makes me
want to shoot him. His shrill “pateela, pateela, pateela,” seems to be a
challenge. Grahame sings—
Cheerily
The partridge now her tuneless call repeats.
For “cheerily” write “cheekily” and you have a good description of the
call of our Indian grey partridge, which may be heard in Madras every
morning during the winter months.
This bird does not build an elaborate nest. There is no necessity for it
to do so. A nest is a nursery in which young birds are for a time
sheltered from the dangers that beset them in the world. When they have
developed sufficiently to be able to look after themselves they leave the
nest.
It is one of the characteristics of the gallinaceous family of birds,
which includes grouse, poultry, pea- and guinea-fowl, pheasants, turkeys,
and quail, that their young are able to run about almost immediately
after issuing from the egg. They are born covered with down, and are thus
at first very unlike their parents. They are in reality larvæ, that is to
say, embryonic forms which are able to fend for themselves with little or
no assistance from their parents. They change into the adult form, not
hidden away in a nursery, but in the open world.
The nest, then, of the partridge is a very insignificant affair. It is
usually a depression in the ground, so shallow as to be barely
perceptible, and always well concealed in a bush or tuft of grass.
Sometimes the eggs are laid on the bare soil, but more usually the
depression is lined with grass or leaves. Occasionally the lining is so
thick as to form a regular pad. From six to nine whitish eggs are laid.
These do not match the ground or material on which they lie, hence cannot
be considered as examples of protective colouring. Their safety depends
on the fact that they are hidden away under a bush or tuft of grass. The
hen, too, is a very close sitter, and her plumage assimilates well with
the surroundings of the nest.