Bulletin - United States National Museum - si-pddr - Smithsonian ...

110 BULLETIN 133, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM
on the borders of the feathers, and the head and neck blackish,
streaked with white. The wings have obscure mottlings of lightpinkish
cinnamon, and the long tail is obscurely banded with narrow
alternating bars of blackish and a lighter color that varies from
whitish and light-pinkish cinnamon to dull brown. The under sur-
face of the body is whitish, with streaks of blackish. The thighs
are obscurely barred with black, ivory yellow, and sayal brown.
At the Riacho Pilaga, Formosa, on August 16, a pair were hunting
along the border of a lagoon in search for food. They flew from
perch to perch on low rounded masses of reeds that projected from
floating vegetation lodged against the rushes, or dropped down to
the partly submerged stuff below. As they flew the white band
across the tail was so prominent as to attract attention at once.
They paid no attention to me as I drifted down on them with the
wind in an unwieldy cachiveo made from the trunk of a silk-cotton
tree, until I came near enough to secure both birds. They were
male and female, and though not in breeding condition, I was of the
opinion that they were paired. The soft parts, similar in both
sexes, were as follows: Bill mainly black; a space on maxilla below
nostril and base of mandible gray number 7 ; cere and gape chamois
iris verona brown; tarsus and toes primuline yellow; claws black.
On August 21, while passing by train from the station at Kilometer
182 to Formosa, I saw several of these hawks flying over
open marshes. At Puerto Pinasco, Paraguay, I killed an adult
male on September 10. The note emitted by this bird was a shrill
Ker-r-r-re-e-e-e^ with a cadence similar to that of a policeman's
whistle. The species was found, in my experience, mainly in open
country and appeared to hunt over marshes, where its long legs may
have been of service in resting on partly submerged perches or in
securing prey from the water.
BUTEO POLYOSOMA (Quoy and Gaimard)
Falco Polyosoma Quoy and Gaimard, Voy. Uranie Physicienne, Zool.,
August, 1824, p. 92, pi. 14. (Falkland Islands.)
A handsome adult male of this species was taken at General Koca,
Rio Negro, on December 2, 1920, as it rested on a pole and tore at
the body of a cavy held in its feet. Others were observed soaring
over the dry gravel hills of this region, in apiDcarance and action
suggesting red-tailed hawks. On December 6, at Kilometer 1097,
between Neuquen and Zapala, I observed a nest of this hawk placed
on a telegraph pole, where it was supported by the wires. The
owners of the structure rested in the tops of low bushes a few feet
away. A hawk of this species was observed near Zapala, Neuquen,
on December 8. Buteonine hawks were seen in the foothills of the
;