Both species are chiefly diurnal, the former frequenting the high grass of the open "campos" in pairs and parties of five or six, the latter forests or bushy districts; they roost on trees, stalk about in stately fashion, stoop when running, and fly a little when hard pressed. The barking or screaming cry is chiefly heard towards dusk; the food consists of small mammals, snakes, lizards, snails, worms, insects and their larvae, as well as berries, Chunga preferring the insect diet. Easily domesticated, and in Brazil protected by custom, these birds will guard their owners' fowls; while the male at times incubates and shews off to the females in spring, like a Bustard. Cariama builds a nest of twigs in low trees or bushes; Chunga generally chooses the ground; but in either case the young soon leave their quarters; the two eggs have a pale ground-colour with rufous blotches, as in so many Rails. The Seriemá has been hatched in the Zoological Society's Gardens in London.
The fossil Phororhachos and certain others of the so-called Stereornithes (p. [44]) probably belong here.
Fam. VI. Otididae.–The Bustards are here admitted as a Family of the Gruiformes, though many writers have preferred to refer them to the Limicolae, and the question is by no means finally settled. The head is flat, the neck thick, the bill somewhat blunt and depressed, being either short, as in Otis and Trachelotis, or longer, as in Neotis and Lissotis. The metatarsus varies much, the length for instance being comparatively great in Houbaropsis, and small in Otis tetrax, while both surfaces are covered with reticulated scales; the short, stout toes have flattish nails, and the hallux is absent, as in many Limicoline forms. The wings are moderate, with the secondaries almost equal to the primaries, the latter–which are acuminate in Sypheotis–being eleven in number, and the former about twenty; the tail, of medium length, has a more or less rounded outline, and possesses from fourteen to twenty rectrices. Ornamental plumes are characteristic of this group, and take the form of decided crests on the crown and nape, or on the latter alone, in all the genera except Otis, Neotis, Lissotis, Trachelotis, and Sypheotis; the last-named, however, has elongated cheek-feathers with bare shafts and spatulate webs. The plumes of the throat and fore-neck are lengthened and shield the breast in Houbaropsis and Eupodotis, those of the sides of the neck form a ruff in Houbara; while Otis is remarkable for the prolonged ear-coverts, and for the tuft of long bristly feathers on each side of the base of the mandible in the male.
The nostrils are pervious, the tongue is sagittate, the furcula is Y-shaped, and often ancylosed with the sternum, the syrinx is tracheo-bronchial. An after-shaft is present, and the down, which is uniform in the young only, is in them mottled with black and lighter tints. A most remarkable phenomenon, moreover, is the gular pouch, opening under the tongue, found in the male of some examples of Otis tarda during the breeding season. This pouch becomes very small or vanishes altogether at other times of the year, and seems to be restricted to adult birds. Similar, but smaller, processes have been observed in Eupodotis kori, E. edwardsi and, it is said, Otis tetrax; while dilatations of the oesophagus have been recorded in E. australis and Neotis denhami.
Fig. 54.–Great Bustard. Otis tarda. × ⅑ or ⅒.
Otis tarda, the Great Bustard, which, as a native, only became extinct in Norfolk about 1838, used to extend from East Lothian to Dorset, but is now merely an occasional visitor to Britain. The upper parts are mottled with rufous, buff, and blackish-brown, the head is blue-grey, with long white bristles at the base of the mandible, the lower surface is white, relieved in the male by a tawny gorget for a short time during the breeding season. The primaries are black, most of the secondaries and wing-coverts white. Some other Bustards seem to have a similar vernal change of plumage. The female is smaller and has no bristles. O. tetrax, the Little Bustard, a straggler to our shores, is somewhat like the last species in colour, but has the cheeks and throat grey, bordered by a white line, and below this comes a broad black collar divided in front by a median white band in the nesting time. The female is brown and black, with white breast and no collar. The remaining members of the Family vary considerably in pattern of colour, being spotted, streaked, or vermiculated above, and being occasionally very dark; the head and the lower parts, moreover, are not uncommonly quite black, or the latter may be greyish-blue, as in Trachelotis coerulescens. The bill and feet are usually yellow, more seldom greyish or dusky. Females and young exhibit a more uniform mixture of brown, black, and buff, while rufous bases to the feathers are characteristic of the group.
Bustards are Old World birds, reaching eastwards to Australia, where Eupodotis australis is called the "Native Turkey." E. edwardsi inhabits the plains of India, E. arabs extends from Arabia to North Africa, and E. kori from the East to the South of that continent. Otis ranges over South and Central Europe, and thence to North Africa, inhabiting also Mid-Asia to North-West India, the Yangtze-Kiang River and Japan. Houbara undulata, the African Ruffed Bustard, reaches from the Canaries,[[176]] through the Mediterranean basin to about Armenia; its congener H. macqueeni, which strays westward to Britain, being resident in Persia, North India and Central Asia. Houbaropsis bengalensis and Sypheotis aurita are the Florican and Lesser Florican of India; Lophotis, Compsotis, Heterotetrax, Neotis, Lissotis, and Trachelotis inhabit the Ethiopian Region. The members of the Family are to some extent migratory, and perhaps the Great Bustard was partly so of old in Britain.
The members of this Family flock in winter, and occasionally form small parties at other seasons, the males being very possibly polygamous, though the fact is hardly proved. Typically inland birds, they haunt dry grassy and sandy plains, or cultivated ground where the crops are low, yet sometimes they choose more bushy flats, or stony tops of elevated ridges. Their flight is prolonged and often rapid, though invariably heavy, the neck and legs being outstretched; the Great Bustard rises from the ground slowly, the Little Bustard with a rattling noise, but they are frequently loth to leave it, crouching to escape detection on the similarly coloured soil. They stalk about rapidly and run with ease, being shy, wary, and far-sighted, while they are more easy to approach when they resort to water. The quill-feathers are said to be lost after breeding.[[177]] In spring the pugnacious cocks strut around the hens, swelling out their plumage, and inflating the gular pouch when it is present; the head meanwhile is thrown backwards, the wings droop, the tail is usually erected and outspread, and booming or crooning utterances with leaps diversify the performance. At times the notes are described as scolding, drumming, craking, and clucking, or resemble "cok-cok" or "prut-prut." The diet consists chiefly of juicy plants, such as young corn and turnips, clover and plantains, but it includes berries and seeds, insects and their larvae, molluscs, myriapods, frogs, or even small reptiles and mammals. The Gom-Paauw[[178]] (Eupodotis kori) is so-called from its love of mimosa gum. The eggs, varying from two to four or five in different species, are deposited in an excavation in the soil–sometimes lined with grass–under shelter of a bush, tussock, or growing crop; they are oily-green, olive, drab, red-brown, or exceptionally bluish-green, and are generally blotched, clouded, or zoned with purplish or dull red. The hen sits very closely. Bustards can be circumvented by riding round them in constantly diminishing circles, and they are also captured with Falcons.[[179]]
A fossil Otis is recorded from the Miocene of France and Germany.