Studies of less familiar birds 142. Little Bustard

By I. J. Ferguson-Lees

Photographs by M. D. England and A. N. H. Peach (Plates 9-11)

T H E S E S T U D I E S of a female Little Bustard Otis tetrax at the nest provide an interesting comparison with those of the female Great Bustard O. tarda by the same two photographers (Brit. Birds, 59: 22-27, frontispiece and plates 1-8).

The Little Bustard breeds from north-west Africa and Iberia across southern Europe and Asia Minor into Siberia and south to Turkestan. Southern populations tend to be sedentary, but northern ones move south in winter into the Mediterranean region, Iran and north-west India, some individuals occasionally reaching Egypt and Iraq; they are less migratory in western Europe than in the east. The species was first recorded in Britain in 1751, but, unlike the Great Bustard, has never been known to nest here. According to Seebohm (1883-85), Little Bustards used to be recorded in Britain about every other year in the 19th century, chiefly in winter, and there were one or two sizeable in­fluxes, particularly in the winter of 1874/75. There were rather more

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records in the first part of the 20th century, especially in Yorkshire, East Anglia and some south coast counties, but also including Wales, Scotland and Ireland. In the last twenty years, however, despite the great increase in the number of observers, fewer have been seen and this is perhaps a measure of the species' decline as a result of mechanisa­tion of farming, destruction of habitat, shooting and other factors; it formerly had a wider breeding range in central Russia, eastern Ger­many, Austria, Hungary, Palestine and Syria, and perhaps Poland and East Prussia. In the eight years 1958-65 only five were recorded, all in the south-eastern quarter of England except for one in Wigtown and including three in the spring and summer months of April, June and July. Vagrants have also wandered to Madeira, the Canaries, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands, Scandinavia, Finland and the Baltic States (Vaurie 1965). Vaurie treates the species as monotypic, but some taxonomists separate the eastern population irkntalis as slightly greyer and less rufous above and also tending to be larger, but there is much overlap.

Like other bustards, this species is a bird of flat or undulating open country. It is found on grassy plains and steppes and also in extensive cereals and other crops. Often it is at its highest density where open grassland meets poor cultivation and there is little mechanisation or disturbance. It feeds mainly on grasses and other vegetable matter and also takes grasshoppers, beetles and other insects, but less of such animals as snails, small frogs and voles than the Great Bustard does. It is probably not much preyed on by animal predators, but M. D. England found the remains of an adult in the nest of a pair of Eagle Owls Bubo bubo in Portugal in 1965.

The nest (plate 1 ib) is often nothing more than an unlined scrape, but it sometimes includes the stalks of grasses, clover or other plants trod­den down or uprooted on the spot. The eggs are the size of a Coot's Fulica atra and usually three to five in number, but clutch size evidently varies in different areas and may average larger further south. In Portu­gal, for example, M. D. England has found five to be the commonest clutch, whereas in France, in Eure-et-Loir almost on the latitude of Paris and near the northern limit of the species' range, Labitte (1955) found that clutches of five eggs were rare and that there were often only two in replacement layings. At least this species does lay again if the first nest is destroyed, whereas the Great Bustard apparently does not. Many nests are destroyed by ploughing or reaping, by cattle or sheep, and by the eggs being eaten by man or bird predators, while if the female is flushed suddenly from the nest she will sometimes desert. Replacements of clutches lost maybe the cause of late nests rather than the double-broodedness suggested in The Handbook. The species is generally stated to breed from the middle of April through to July, but

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in northern France it does not begin to arrive back after the winter until 3rd-23rd April (Labitte 1955, 1961, Boutinot 1957) and nesting does not usually start until the second half of May. In fact, it is probably only in Iberia and north-west Africa that breeding ever begins much before May and even there many males are still displaying in late May long after the Great Bustards have ceased. At the other end of the sea­son Labitte found young only 15-20 days old at the end of August.

The female alone incubates (plates 9-11a), but the male often stays near the nest and in one case was habitually flushed from just beside it (M. D. England). Most females are very reluctant to leave the eggs and, particularly when incubation is well under way, some remain on the nest until almost trodden on. Dr. A. N. H. Peach tells me that it was possible to stand within three feet of the one in these photographs and, even then, have difficulty in picking her out; when the hide was moved, she stayed on the nest while the posts were hammered into the hard ground only ten feet from her. Plate 10b shows the way the sitting female crouches right down and becomes almost invisible when an intruder is near. The rest of the time she sits with her neck more or less extended (plate 9) and, especially in the southern parts of the range, pants and raises her body feathers in an attempt to keep cool (plate 11 a). When the surrounding cover is tall enough, she will pull it down over her in the same way as a wader or a crake does. When disturbed from the nest she usually runs or creeps away, but sometimes she flies a short distance and, if the male is near, both will then fly round together. Incubation lasts about three weeks and the young are then fed and tended by the female alone. They are sandy-buff marked with blackish-brown (plate 1 ic) and leave the scrape as soon as they are dry.

Some males are polygamous—Boutinot (1957) stated that most were in northern France, but that it was impossible to know whether two or three females were involved—and it is not uncommon for there to be two nests in quite a small area. This is probably also the reason for the occasional nests which are found with six to nine eggs. As an indication of density, Boutinot stated that the males could be found 200-300 metres apart and Labitte (1956) recorded four 01 five males in less than a square kilometre, but in Portugal in 1964 I found the density to be rather higher than this. At first light when display activity is in full swing (see below) it was possible to see as many as seven males from one vantage point within a radius of perhaps 500 metres and to hear others as well, and I estimated that one area of about a kilometre square held at least 13-16 males.

The Little Bustard's display, although less spectacular than that of the Great Bustard recently illustrated (Brit. Birds, 5 9: 491 -49 3, plates 70-71), is still very striking. Before describing it, it is necessary to say a little about the plumage of the species. The female, shown in the

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photographs, is generally sandy-brown marked with black above and this colour extends to the neck and upper breast; the rest of the under­pays are buffish-white with bold marks on the flanks. The male in winter looks much the same, but in the breeding season differs in having a blue-grey face, a zigzag pattern of black and white on the neck and much more white in the wings; he is less coarsely marked above than the female and his sandy-brown colouring looks very pale at a distance. In flight, indeed, he shows so much white on the wings and under­pays that one's eye is detracted from the darker feathering and at a fair range he looks largely white like a Shelduck Tadorna tadorna (though nearer a Wigeon Anas penelope in total length). This species does, in fact, look very duck-like in flight, though its shallow wing-beats and short glides are like those of a game-bird, and it has the ability to rise at a sharp angle. The adult male produces a distinctive whistling sound in flight and Boutinot found that the slightest wing-beat of a male held in the hand still produced this noise; it is apparently mechanical and caused by the unusually deep emarginations on the 4th primary (until about 16 months old, i.e. after the first complete moult, there is nothing abnormal about this feather). The male also rises with a-rattle of wings and a single short note. The female is usually silent except when she has young; then she utters a characteristic trou-trou-trou, trrr-trrr or kiak-kiak (Boutinot').

Like the Great Bustard, but in quite a different way, the male makes use of the partly hidden areas of white in display. He stands erect with drooping wings, spread tail and 'swollen' neck (an effect produced by erecting the neck feathers) and at frequent intervals jerks back his head to utter a monosyllabic throbbing snort prrtt which is not very loud, yet carries considerable distances and is ventriloquial to the extent that it sounds the same whether it is 5 o metres or 5 00 metres away. After uttering this note he spreads his wings and may or may not jump up into the air to a height which varies from a few inches to several feet. The effect of this is a sudden flash of white which is most striking, particularly in the half-light of dawn when display is especially marked and one then has the impression of a number of scattered lights flashing at intervals over the open countryside. This behaviour continues for hours with periodic lulls and bursts of activity. The male has well-defined display grounds and these may take the form of roughly circular areas of perhaps 15 metres in diameter, round which he walks inter­spersing the display with feeding, preening, stretching or even dis­appearing by crouching down on the ground, or sometimes of several adjacent knolls or raised places only a foot or two across. In the latter cases in particular the grass tends to get beaten down and the area covered with droppings. The male also has a distinctive display flight with wings depressed and neck upstretched at an angle and again swol-

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len by erected feathers. The fullest account of the display of this species is that given by Boutinot who also described the male's display to the female, to another male and to a human being, the behaviour of females before and during incubation and with young, the nesting, the behaviour of the young and the weights, measurements and stomach contents of birds found dead.

The largest parties in spring and summer are usually less than a dozen of both sexes (but with females predominant) and presumably involve non-breeders. Small flocks are formed from August onwards and, after the northern populations move south in late September, flocks of several scores or hundreds may be seen in the wintering areas. The occurrence and behaviour of flocks of up to 135, 150 and 300-400 in autumn and winter in the south of France has been described by Leveque and E m (i960), while Vuilleumier (i960) has recorded a flock of about 350 in March in the department of Gard.

REFERENCES BOUTINOT, S. (1957): 'Notes sur la nidification de l'Outarde canepetiere {Otis tetrax

L.) dans la region de Saint-Quentin'. UOiseau, 27: 205-213. LABITTE, A. (1955): 'La reproduction d'Otis tetrax (L.) dans la partie nord du

departement d'Eure-et-Loir'. UOiseuu, 25 : 144-147. • "— (1956): 'Quelques notes complementaires sur la reproduction de l'Outarde

canepetiere, Otis tetrax'. UOiseau, 26: 67-68. (1961): 'Statut de l'Outarde canepetiere Otis tetrax dans le department

d'Eure-et-Loir'. UOiseau, 31: 167-169. LEVEQUE, R., and ERN, H. (i960): 'Sur l'hivernage de l'Outarde canepetiere Otis

tetrax dans le midi de la France.' Alauda, 28:5 7-60. SEEBOHM, H. (1883-85): A History of British Birds. London, vol. 2: 587-590. VAURIE, C. (1965): TheBirdsqfthePalearcticFama. London, vol. 2: 339-340. VUILLEUMIER, F. (i960): 'A propos de l'Outarde canepetiere {Otis tetrax) dans le

midi de la France'. Alauda. 28: 233.

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P L A T E 9. Female Little Bustard Otis tetrax on nest, Portugal, May 1965. Her plumage above is sandy-brown marked with black and this pattern extends to neck and upper breast; she is about the size of a Wigeon. Nests are often in grass, scrub or potato crops rather than tall cereals (pages So-84) {photo: M. D. England)

P L A T E IO. Female Little Bustard Otis tetrax on nest, Portugal, May 1965. Above, settling down on the eggs and panting in the hot sun. Below, crouching right down as someone approaches, so that her outline merges into the background; she stays still when alarmed and may not move until almost trodden on {photos: A.N.H. Peach)

P L A T E I I . Above, the female again panting in the heat, this time with feathers raised for cooling. Below, unlined scrape with three eggs, which vary from light olive to olive-brown with faint brown smears and streaks {photos: M. D. England); also the downy chick, sandy-buff marked with blackish-brown {photo: P. Geroudei)