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Ortygornis gularis, Temminck.
Vernacular Names—[Kyah, Kair, Kaijah. Bengal, &c. ; Bun-teetur ; Jungliteetur
[Hindustani) ; Koi, Koera, Assam ; Jihil-titar, Caehar; ]
HE range of the Swamp Partridge is as yet ill defined,
and its distribution very local and apparently capricious.
It occurs here and there throughout the
Terai region which skirts the southern bases of the
Himalayas from Pilibhi't to Sadiya, our easternmost
station in Assam. It occurs in places along
the banks of the Gogra, and along the northern bank
of the Ganges (crossing, in some parts of the Monghyr, Bhagulpur
and Rajmchal districts, to the southern bank also) from
near Benares to Bhaulia. It is found in the Jessore Sunderbans,
in Dacca, Dinagepore, Rungpore and Maldah, and along the
Megna and Brahmaputra and the lower courses of rivers running
into these, in Tipperah, Sylhet, Cachar, Goalpara and every other
of the Assam valley districts, north and south of the Brahmaputra,
right away to Sadiya. It does sometimes ascend the hills,
for the late Captain Beavan obtained it at Chcra Punji at an
elevation of 4,000 feet. Mr. Damant* writes that he has shot it
at the foot of the Garo Hills, but that it is not found in the Naga
Hills or in Manipur.
It does not occur, so far as is known, anywhere in British
Burma or anywhere outside our limits.
HIGH GRASS jungle (often mingled with cane brakes and thorny
thickets), in the neighbourhood of large swamps or on or near
the banks of the larger rivers and their tributaries, seem to be
almost exclusively the habitats of this fine species, of which
personally I have seen but little.
* Mr. Damant says:—"I have shot this species in the districts of Dinagepore,
Rungpore, Maldah, Sylhet, Cachar, and the Garo Hills It is not found in Manipur,
nor in the Naga Hills, and, to the best of my belief, it is never found in any
hills I have shot it in the Garo Hills, but only in low ground at the foot of the
hills, and never in the hills themselves. It is common on the Brahmaputra churs,
and it breeds in all the districts I have mentioned above."