This bird is found in the brush country of Eastern Australia.
At the other extreme stand the Namaqua and Scaly Doves. The former is regarded by Professor Newton as one of the most graceful in form of all the Pigeon Tribe: the latter are scarcely, if at all, larger than the sparrows.
The power of flight of some forms is, however, extremely limited; they bid fair in course of time to become flightless, like the dodo and the solitaire. The most interesting of these is the Grey-naped Ground-pigeon. Pigeons for the most part display a marked preference for a life among the trees rather than on the ground; but there are some which are essentially ground-dwellers. The species in which this changed habit is most deeply rooted, and probably of longest standing, exhibit one very interesting point of difference from their neighbours of the woods. This difference consists in the very considerably longer legs which mark the ground-haunting bird. The Grey-naped Ground-pigeon of South-east New Guinea forms an excellent example, inasmuch as the legs are much longer than in any other pigeon. These birds (for there are three species in all) resemble the Megapodes in habit, and frequent hills or dense thickets. They lay one egg, which is deposited at the foot of a tree.
Photo by L. Medland, F.Z.S.] [North Finchley.
MALE BLACK-BELLIED SAND-GROUSE.
Young sand-grouse run directly they are hatched, thus differing from young pigeons.
Among domesticated breeds is the English Pouter, a bird characterised by its enormous gullet, which can be distended with air whenever the owner wills. The carriage of the body is vertical, not, as in pigeons generally, horizontal. The Carrier is a breed illustrating the result of long-sustained selection to increase, amongst other characters, the development of the bare skin surrounding the eye and beak of all pigeons, wild or tame. In the Short-faced Tumbler we have a breed wherein those birds with the shortest beaks have been steadily bred from. To-day so little beak is left that some individuals are hatched which, when grown up, are unable to feed themselves. An example of a radical change in the feathers is the Indian Frill-back. In this case the feathers all over the body are reversed, or turned forwards, giving the bird a quite extraordinary appearance. In the Jacobin we have a breed—and we could cite others—wherein the feathers of the neck are much elongated, and turn upwards and forwards over the head to form a hood.
In general appearance Sand-grouse are small, very short-legged birds, with small heads and pointed wings and tail. Their general tone of coloration may be described as sand-coloured, and this has been adopted to render them in harmony with the barren sand-wastes in which they dwell. But some may be described as quite highly coloured, being banded and splashed with chestnut, black, pearly grey, white, and yellow, according to the species.
Pallas's Sand-grouse is a native of the Kirghiz Steppes, extending through Central Asia to Mongolia and Northern China, and northwards to Lake Baikal, and southwards to Turkestan. Here they may be met with in enormous numbers. In North China large numbers are often caught after a snow-storm. The snow is cleared away, and a small green bean is scattered about. Young sand-grouse differ remarkably in one particular from young pigeons, inasmuch as the former are hatched covered with a thick down, and are able to run about soon after leaving the egg, whilst the pigeon comes into the world very helpless and much in need of clothing. Three eggs are laid by the sand-grouse, and these are double-spotted; whilst the pigeon lays but two, which are white. The eggs of the sand-grouse are laid in a depression in the ground, without any nest.