Ibex vary very much in colour according to age, locality and the season. In their winter coats the old bucks, though looking almost white at a distance, and showing up conspicuously among the brown young bucks and females, are really very patchy looking at close quarters, the head and part of the neck being a sepia brown, the middle of the body generally yellowish white with a dark stripe on the back, and the quarters again brown, with legs of dark sepia. In the summer they are sepia-coloured all over, the head and neck often darker than the body—in fact, an old buck looks sometimes almost black at a distance; the beard is thick and very dark brown.
Ibex are to be found pretty nearly everywhere in the higher ranges of hills from Gilgit to Spiti, though they do not appear to cross the Sutlej to the eastward of Spiti. To name a particular valley would be only misleading. Favourite districts soon get shot out as regards good heads, and the only trustworthy information to work on is that of the year previous. If you get a good nullah, there is no sport in the Himalayas more charming. Parts of the ground no doubt will test your nerve as a cragsman, but it does not entail the perpetual climbing of markhor and ther ground, and in April, May and June a fair number of good chances may be relied upon. As Ward says, ‘Patience and steady shooting are what are necessary; a man does not require to be a first-rate walker or a really brilliant shot during that season; but he does require to be enduring, and not too eager about getting up at once to his game.’ Of course, if the sportsman blazes away at indifferent heads he will not get the big ones; but if he sees a good head one day and cannot get it, if he does not disturb the beast, he will see him again next day somewhere near the same place, and sooner or later be able to close accounts with him; ten heads, all over thirty inches, which would probably include two or three over forty inches, would be a far better bag for two months’ work than twenty heads in the same time, including a lot of rubbishy little things about twenty-five inches.
If you wish thoroughly to enjoy your stalk, and the ground is not too difficult, insist upon going first and making your shikari carry your rifle behind you. He will probably object, but be firm, and listen to none of his plausible arguments; carry out your own stalk without asking his advice, simply telling him what you mean to do. When you are within two hundred yards of where you expect to get your shot, make him lie down, take the rifle from him and go on alone. Warn him beforehand that if he moves till you tell him, you’ll fine him. When you reach your place, get your wind before you look over; you will see perhaps fifteen or twenty ibex in front of you; don’t be in a hurry; make sure that you have really selected the best head for your first shot, and take pains to get it home. When you fire, the smoke will hang in your eyes, and you will dimly see the flock scatter. Keep your head now—don’t show yourself; and if you are in about the right place, a little above, but nearly on a level with the flock, and about eighty yards off, not closer, you will probably see the flock walking up the hillside, occasionally turning round to gaze at the 40-incher lying dead below them. With cartridges handy, and steady shooting, you should add the next two or three best heads to your score. You have no shikari at your elbow nudging you, and whispering advice just as you are going to fire, starting off the flock by showing himself immediately after your first shot, and finally, when you have got all the heads you care for out of the flock, imploring you to shoot a worthless little brute for the coolies to eat. Call him up when you have finished, and let him cut the throats of the slain to make them lawful eating, low down the neck, so as not to spoil the skin for stuffing, and if he objects, tell him he may do without meat. One of the greatest mistakes that all shikaries make in stalking is trying to get too close to the game. It stands to reason, in a country infested by leopards or ounces, that if a beast catches sight of the top of one’s head within five and twenty yards, he will bolt at once, whereas at eighty yards distance he feels at all events safe from a sudden rush, and will stop to gaze.
After the end of June it is practically waste of time trying for ibex. There is grass everywhere, and to escape the gadflies and be out of the way of the flocks of sheep and goats that are driven up into many of the best nullahs in summer, the ibex retire to the highest peaks in the neighbourhood, and rarely descend to ground where there is any chance of getting near them.
XXXVIII.—THE IBEX OF PERSIA AND SINDH (Capra ægagrus)
Native names: ‘Pasang,’ male; ‘Boz,’ female; generally Boz Pasang in Persia (Blanford); Kayeek in Asia Minor (Danford)
This ibex extends from the Taurus mountains in Asia Minor, through the Caucasus range and Persia, to Afghanistan, Beluchistan and Sindh.
It is a smaller animal than the Himalayan ibex, and does not ascend to the same altitude, preferring, according to Mr. Danford, elevations of 2,000 to 5,000 ft., while 8,000 ft. is about the lowest limit of the Himalayan variety. In Beluchistan and Afghanistan these ibex and O. Blanfordi are found on the same ground, just as Capra Jerdoni and Ovis cycloceros are in the Suleiman range; and this peculiar trait of preferring hot low hills is, in the writer’s estimation, the great point of difference between Capra ægagrus, Capra Jerdoni and Ovis cycloceros on the one side, and Capra sibirica, Capra megaceros and Ovis Vignei on the other.
The general colour of the buck Capra ægagrus is brown with a dark line down the back, and a black beard, but the last is not so profuse as in Capra sibirica. The females are lighter in colour, and have small horns. The horns are quite different from those of any other species of ibex; instead of having a flat front and being thinner behind than in front, as most other ibex horns are, these horns have the edge in front, a scimitar-like ridge running up the front of the horn, wavy but unbroken for about one-third above the head, and then represented by knobs which spring up at some distance apart for about another third, when the ridge appears again, but rapidly dies away towards the point. The sides of the horn too are smooth, the outer side rounded and the inner flat, the knobs not running down the sides as in other ibex.