Perdicula asiática, Latham.
Vernacular Names.—[Lowa (Hindustani); Gorza(? Hindi); Juhar, Manblioom
; Auriconnai (¿onthali); Ghza-pitta (Telegu); Kari-lowga (Canarese),
Mysore.}
LTHOUGH the haunts and distribution of the
present and the next species, the Rock Bush-Quail,
are somewhat different, yet the two species are so
similar in habits, resemble each other so closely, and
are so persistently confounded even by ornithologists*
that I am compelled to preface my remarks
on the first of these two species, by setting forth, as
clearly as I can, the distinctions that exist between them, and
the points which may be relied on for their discrimination.
The adults of both sexes (and I believe most of the young
also) may be distinguished at a glance by two characters.
ist.—The bright chestnut hue of the chin and throat of the
Jungle Bush-Quail, which contrasts equally strongly with the
white, black-barred, lower surface of the male and the dull
rufous of the same parts in the female. In the Rock Bush-
Quail, the chin and throat are dull rufous, the chin often being,
especially in the females, whitish, and in these latter the throat
is unicolorous with the breast. It is difficult to represent
colours accurately in words, but bright chestnut and dull rufous
'slightly suffused in many specimens with a grey shade) are so
different that this colouration of chin and throat ought alone
to suffice to distinguish adults, at any rate, of the two species.
2nd.—The long, well-marked yellowish white superciliary
stripe which, in the Jungle Bush-Quail, begins in males at the
nostrils, and in females a little further back, and in both runs
over the eyes and ear-coverts right down to the nape, averaging
in males I T 5 and in females 09 in length. In the Rock Bush-
Quail the supercilium is by no means well marked, very
narrow, and only just extends to the ear-coverts; in many
* Thus, Mr. Gould, B. of As., XV., pis. 12 and 13, gives us some beautiful
figures of what he supposes to be the two species, asiaiua, the Jungle Bush-Quail,
and argoomiah, the Rock Bush-Quail ; but all his figures really represent one species
only, t'/=., the Jungle Bush-Quail, and what he supposes to be an adult female of
argcondah is merely the young of the Jungle Bush-Quail before the chestnut of the
throat has shown out.