Nests and eggs of Indian birds : rough draft / by Allan Hume.

  • Allan Hume
Date:
1873
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Nests and eggs of Indian birds : rough draft / by Allan Hume. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    they were very particular and had a great eye for a handsome nest; whereas, after all their fuss and bother, the nest is a loose ragged-looking affair, that no respectable crow even would condescend to lay in. The greatest number of eggs I have ever taken in a nest was four; but I am inclined to think that the generality only lay three. The eggs do not vary much in shape. They are a little shorter and stouter than those of Chiquera typus. They are oval or somewhat pyriform, a rather longer egg in proportion to its breadth than one expects to find in this class of bird. They belong to the Goshawk and not to the Sparrow Hawk type. Smooth, fine, glossless shells, of a pure, delicate, pale bluish white, as a rule absolutely devoid of markings; at most, thinly sprinkled all over with very faint greyish specks and spots, thus differing widely from the apparently closely allied A. nisus, whose eggs are often richly, and always, I believe, more or less marked. In size the eggs vary from 1*48 to l165 inch in length, and from 1T2 to 1*32 inch in breadth; but the average of sixteen eggs was 155 by 1*22. 24.—Accipiter nisus, Lin. Sparrow Hawks, belonging probably to both the present and the next species, breed not uncommonly in woody valleys in the interior of the Himalayas. I have repeatedly seen their nests, and once (in May) took one about two marches on the Mussoorie side of Gungootree, containing four bluish white, red blotched eggs, exactly like, it seemed to me, the Sparrow Hawk's eggs I had so often taken as a boy at home. I cannot now be sure whether these eggs belonged to the true nisus or to melaschistus. Captain Thompson of Simla assured me that one or two pairs of the true Sparrow Hawk breed yearly in Annandale, just below Simla, laying in May and June. I verified the fact of one pair breeding there last year, though I failed to secure the eggs. At the same time the great majority of the present species do, unquestion- ably, I think go further north to breed. Hr. Stoliczka remarks: “ Both the Kestrel and Sparrow Hawk were common in the upper Lachen and Lachun^ valleys after the middle of September, evidently migrating southwards. None were seen on the Chola range at the end of August. The Kestrel was seen a few days sooner than the Sparrow Hawk. This is quite my own experience: a few pairs remain to breed all over the Himalayas in well-wooded localities, at elevations of from 5,000 to perhaps 8,000 feet; but the vast majority go further north, and with numberless young birds begin to re-appear in September. Captain Cock took three eggs of this species on the 2nd of June out of a nest in a tree near Soonamurgh, in the valley of Cashmere. The parent bird which I examined is, unquestionably, an adult male nisus, corresponding exactly with our little red European specimens. One of these eggs is a very perfect, rather broad oval. The shell is fine and compact, but there is no gloss. The ground colour is a very delicate pale green, or greenish white, very boldly and profusely smeared, blotched and spotted with a very rich reddish brown, and with a very few small faint, purple clouds here and there underlying the primary markings. The larger end of the egg is nearly spotless, while of the D
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