Corolina Paroquet 215 



composed of a few feathers and rubbish. Morrison took 

 several nests in La Plata co. at about 9,000 feet in June ; 

 they were all in pines in old Woodpeckers' holes, but 

 no eggs appear to have been available for Bendire to 

 examine. 



ORDER PSITTACI. 



This order contains the Parrots, easily distinguished 

 externally by their stout, strongly hooked bill, furnished 

 with a cere, which however is frequently feathered, and 

 by their feet, which are zygodactylous, i.e. the first 

 and fourth toes are posteriorly, the second and third 

 anteriorly directed. 



Family PSITTACID^. 



Genus CONUROPSIS. 



Bill stout ; cere, within which opens the nostrils, completely feathered ; 

 tail long, equal to the wing ; wotlge-shaped and strongly graduated ; 

 tarsus very short, covered with granular scales. 



One species only in the United States. 



Corolina Paroquet. Conuropsis carolinensis. 



A.O.U. Checklist no 382 — Colorado Records — Pike 10, p. 78 (Coues's 

 ed., II., p. 474) ; Coues 77, p. 50 ; Morrison 89, p. 67 ; Hasbrouck 91, 

 p. 369 ; Cooke 97, pp. 81, 162. 



Description. — Above and below, green of various shades ; head all 

 round and edge of wing yellow ; forehead and cheeks orange-red ; 

 iris brown, bill whitish, feet flesh-coloured. Length 12'0 ; wing 7-10 ; 

 tail 5-75 ; cubnen "9 ; tarsus -7. 



The sexes are alike. Young birds are green without yellow. 



Distribution. — Formerly ranging over all of the middle and south- 

 eastern United States, from Colorado, Nebraska and New York south 

 to the Gulf ; now confined to Florida and to a less extent to Arkansas 

 and Oklahoma. 



Pike captirred a live bird new to him on Cliristmas Day, 1806, in the 

 upper Ai'kansas Valley, not far from where Sahda now is. He described 

 it as green with a tufted head, and he fed it on meat. Coues identified 

 it with the Carolina Paroquet, but I am more inclined to think it was 



