doublegunshop.com - home Forums General Discussion DoubleGun BBS @ doublegunshop.com What birds are these?

Hello, a friend who owns the Simson in the photo would want to know what birds
these are. He was thinking guinea fowl -and me too- but is not sure.



Thanks for your feedback,

JC

can you get better detail

grey partridge ?

Unfortunately it is the only photo I have.

These are the owner's musings that give more information as to details:

"At one time I thought they were a depiction of grey partridge however their size, general appearance such as the hump backed appearance led me to believe they were guinea fowl. The problem with this supposition is that the birds in flight which appear to be the male of the species have little horns or tuffs on the head as opposed to one comb. My latest conjecture is that these are spur fowl depictions.
All very interesting to me as certainly not native to Germany and not likely a huntable population there. The gun is from 1928 and I might guess that the person for whom the gun was engraved hunted not only for mallards as depicted on the left plate but also for birds in Africa. I can well imagine that a well heeled German sportsman could well have hunted in South Africa as well as in his home country."

BTW here is the right hand side:

?? Black Game ??

Francolin?

From what I can see, Francolin indeed.

Kind Regards,

Raimey
rse

I'd guess Francolin too CZ, especially with the Africa comment. Then again, it might be a somewhat specialized game bird when compared to the ducks and how they're rendered on the other side.

I posted an Erkel's Francolin, but on further review, I believe the engraving to depict Grey Francolin.
They're great fun over pointing dogs. Delicious sweet pink flesh. Running little buggers.

Some early engraving was a little crude by today's standards. I will go for the European Grey Partridge on the left lock plate with what looks like a couple of pheasants flying in to join them. The countryside round and about the engraving is typical partridge/pheasant habitat. Some of these primitively engraved partridge are known in the trade a 'flying turnips'. Right lock plate is of course drake mallard and a red fox. Lagopus.....

The birds would be intended to look like Grey partridge and phesants,but figures very often don't favor the subject very much, especially on guns 50 or 60 years older than this one.
Mike