LOPHOPHORUS I M PEYAN US
Lophophorus impeyanus, Latham.
Vernacular Names.—[Lont (male), Ham (female). Nil -mor, Jungli-mor, Kashmir;
Manal, Neel, (male), Kururi, Karari (female), Kulltt ; Moonal (male), Moonalee
(female), Ghur-monal, Ruttia Cowan, Ratnal, Rat-kap, Central Himalayas;
Datteya, Thibet and Bhot Pergunnahs of Kumaun and Garhwdl; Dangan,
Dafai, Damphia, Nepal; Cliamdong ( Bhotia), Phodong-pho ( Lepcha) Sikhim.}
ROM the western* borders of Kashmir to the more
western portions, at any rate, of Bhutan, the
Moonal is found in suitable localities throughout
the Himalayas. So far as is known it extends nowhere
beyond these mountains.
WHAT IS essential to this species is elevation and
forest. AH our Pheasants in the Himalayas may, as
Hodgson (I think) pointed out thirty or forty years ago, be
roughly divided into three classes ; firstly, those of the high
mountains to which belong the Moonal, the Snow Cocks, the
Blood Pheasant, and the Tragopans ; secondly, those of the
mid region, the Cheer, the Koklass, and the various Kalij
Pheasants ; and thirdly, the Jungle Fowl of the lower region.
And you must have vegetation and forest as well as considerable
altitudes ; it would be vain to seek the Moonal in the stony
wildernesses of Lahoul and Spiti, or the desert steppes of
Ladakh.
I have shot many Moonal in my time, and have seen a
vast number more. There are few sights more striking, where
birds are concerned, than that of a grand old cock shooting
out horizontally from the hill-side just below one, glittering
and flashing in the golden sunlight, a gigantic rainbow-tinted
gem, and then dropping stone-like, with closed wings, into
the abyss below. I could say a good deal about these glorious
birds, but almost all that I or any one could say was said in
his own inimitable style thirty years ago by my old friend Mr.
Frederic Wilson, whose charming narrative remains a " joy
for ever."
He says : —
" The Moonal is found on almost every hill of any elevation,
from the first great ridge above the plains to the limits of
* Biddulph says; " I have procured the Moonal from Chitral, where it is common."