In Gujerat* the Pintail is more common, occurring, perhaps,
in the proportion of one to five of the Common Snipe, and
this is about the proportion in Khandesh,f but it is rarer still
in the Panch Mahals.
In the Central India Agency (excluding the Bundelkhand
states.) and the western portions of the Central Provinces} it is,
if anything, less common than in Khandesh ; but in Berar,
though still in a decided minority as compared with the Fantail,
it is somewhat more common.
About Bombay,§ the Pintail is as common as the other, and
in the Southern Konkan,]j if anything, more plentiful.
In the Nizam's Dominions, the DcccanT and the Belgaum**
district the two species are about in equal force, but in Mysoreff
the Pintail immensely predominates.
Further south also, though both species occur in every district
and in Ceylon, (rare in some places, common in others)
I believe that the Pintail is, as a rule, most numerous, though
on some of the higher ranges, the Fantail may perhaps be
commonest.
* "In Gujerat the Pintail is not nearly so common, but this Christmas I found
that in a bag of nineteen couple of Snipe there were five couple of Pintails, an
unusually large proportion I think in Gujerat."—J. D. Inverarity.
+ "This Snipe Is rarer than the Common Snipe in Khandesh, .perhaps one out
of fi ve or six being Pintails.
In the Panch Mahals G sthenura was still rarer, and I did not shoot one for
every ten of the Common Snipe."—J. Davidson.
X " I think that at Kauiptee we gel only the Common Snipe."—A. McMaste*.
W. Blanford also says " that about Chanda, Nagpur and the Upper Godavari,
he never met with this species, though for two or three years he examined eveiy
bird he shot."
§ About Bombay the Pintail Snipe IS quite as common as the Fantail. Indeed
about Tanna, and in the Snipe grounds across the Bombay Harbour, you will get
more of the Pintail Snipe than of the other."—7. D Tnverarity,
|| Pintails are abundant throughout the Katnagiri district, and as far as my
experience goes are, if anything, rather more plentiful than the Common Snipe."—.
G. J 'idal.
1T "In the Deccan where Snipe ground and Snipe are scarce, I have always found
the two kin Is nearly equally divided in a day's bag."—J. Davidson.
But note that McMaster says : — A t Secuuderabad about five, and at Bellary
fifteen, or {perhaps twenty per cent, only were Pintails."
** "The Pintail Snipe is very common in the neighbourhood of Belgium ;—in
fact about one-half the birds IN every bag dial I have examined have been Pintails."—•
E. A. Butler.
i t '' In Tumkur, Mysore, where there arc many tanks and a good many Snipe,
seven or eight Pin-tails would BE shot for one Common Snipe."—y. Davidson.
"Out of 315 Snipe lately examined by me and shot in the Mysore, Hassan,
Tumkur, Chilaldiug and Kadut districts of the Province of Mysore—
255, or So'95 per cent, were Pintails,
42, or 13 '34 ,, ,, Fantails,
3, or 0'9S it TI Jacks, and
15, or 476 ,, „ Painters."—C. Melnroy Major.
XX Mr. Bourdillon remarks •—" The specimen was obtained by Mr. Ferguson at
4.000 feet. The Pintail Snipe occurs in the cold season, at all elevations ; it is
very scarce at the higher elevations, and most abundant in the rice fields in the
plains. About Trevandrum they are much more abundant than G. seohpaciuus.
On the Patnis Mr. Fairbank only procured the Fantail. On the Nilgiris,
however, Colonel McMaster says that the Pintail is almost the only Snipe seen.
Further north on the eastern side of the Peninsula* in the
Northern Circars, the eastern portions of the Central Provinces,
Orissa, the Tributary Mahals, Chota Nagpur, Gya—in fact the
country between the Ganges and the Godavari apud Ball—it
is difficult to make out (so discrepant! are the accounts) m
what proportion the two' species occur; but I gather that in the
level, low-lying, rice-growing tracts, the Pintail predominates,
while in the hilly, jungly portions of this vast area the Common
Snipe is much more numerous.
In Lower Bengal, west of the Brahmaputra, I believe, that
both species arc, taking the whole season round, about equally
plentiful; but at any rate about Calcutta, and probably generally
in Lower Bengal, this species greatly predominates towards the
commencement of the season. In Bengal, cast of the Brahmaputra,
in Assam, right up to Sadiya, and in Cachar and
Sylhct, I gather^ that, though both species are found everywhere,
the Pintail is on the whole decidedly the most common.
In Arakan, Pegu, Tenasserim, the Andamans and Nicobars,
* Colonel McMaster writes that out of a bag of 38 couple made near Madras,
which he examined carefully, exactly half were Pin and half Kan tails.
t According to Ball, S. F,, FX, 431, while the Common Snipe is common IN
Chota Nagpur, he personally never met with the Pintail ; and from his general
rhuml of the Avifauna of the enlirc tract lying between the Ganges and the
G6DAVARI, it is to be gathered that he considers the Fantail the common universally
distributed species, and the Pintail only of occasional occurrence in a few localities.
But from Cut tack, Ganjam and Vizagapatam, I am informed that the
Pintail is the Common Snipe. From Raipore, Blewitt wrote: "Out one day
towards the end of April, shooting with Colonel Eullerton and Captain Sherman,
we found numbers of Snipe in a plot of low-lying, swampy rice ground some six acres
in extent, and I noted that out of 47 couple, which we killed, all but five and a half
were Pintails." And again of the northern part of the tract, of which Gya may be
taken as the centre, Brooks writes : "On the whole the Pintail is more frequently
met with along the Chord Line than the Common Snipe." The fact is. Ball's
geological work kept him, I fancy, mostly in the hilly poitions of the vast area
about which he writes, where the strata are exposed, and took him comparatively
little into the level, low-lying, alluvial tracts, and hence perhaps the great discrepancy
between his view of the relative abundance of this species and those
of other observers.
* The most opposite opinions, however, are expressed; and the above is only
my ad-itifeiim conclusion based on a mass of very discrepant evidence. In
weighing this I have had to make the best estimate I can of the relative value of
opposing statements, and therefore my conclusions based on it may prove to be
erroneous. No one can ever know the trouble I have taken to work out this
question, or (he difficulties that 1 have met with in so doing. I will give an
instance: A and 1!, both gentlemen, in every way entitled to credence, but both
personally unknown to me, wrote from the same station. A said: "The
Pintail is the Snipe of the district ; we kill five of these at least to every Fantail."
B wrote: "The Common Snipe is very common here: not so the Pintail, which
I have rarely met with." What was one to do? I sent A's letter to B, B's to A,
and begged both to work the question out on the spot. A like a sensible man set
to work and registered all his own and friend's kills ; B wrote mc an ill-cnn«idercd
letter, asking if I meant to impugn his word, and refusing to have anything more to
say to me. A's figures, though not so large as I should have wished, bore out his
assertions ; and (though I may have cried in so doing), looking to the conduct
of both. I conceived A to be the most reliable witness, and accepted his view.
I may add in regard to Assam that my collectors have sent me altogether ten
Pintails, collected partly on the Khasi Hills, partly about Sibsagar, Oibrugaih
and Sadiva, but not one Fantail, which looks as if the latter were greatly 'ft the
minority.