248 Birds of Colorado 



An example of this species was recently secured by Aiken at Hoehne, 

 near Trinidad, on June 11th, 1908. This constitutes a new record for 

 Colorado. 



Family CYPSELID^E. 



This family contains the Swifts — birds distinguished 

 for their great power of rapid flight. The following 

 are a few of the most obvious external characters, 

 sufficient to distinguish them : Bill very small, flattened 

 and triangular, but with the gape of the mouth very 

 large and extending back to under the eye ; no rictal 

 bristles ; wing long, thin and pointed, made up chiefly 

 of the primaries, which are ten in number ; secondaries 

 very short and reduced ; tail-feathers ten, variable in 

 shape and arrangement ; legs and feet small and weak, 

 adapted only for perching ; toes four, variously arranged 

 in different genera. 



The salivary glands of the Swifts are very greatly 

 developed, and their secretion, which forms a gluey mass, 

 is used more or less in the construction of the nest. 



Key of the Genera. 



A. Tarsi feathered, plumage black and white. Aeronautes, p. 249. 



B. Tarsi naked, plumage black, no white. Cypseloides, p. 248. 



Genus CYPSELOIDES. 



Nostrils embedded in the frontal feathers ; wing with the outer 

 primary the longest ; tail forked, the feathers obtusely pointed, but 

 the shafts not produced to form needlo-like points ; tarsi naked, hallux 

 normal, turned backwards, slightly elevated above the others ; 

 plumage black. 



An exclusively American genus with five or six species, one of which 

 is fovmd in the western United States. 



Black Swift. Cypseloides niger horealis. 



A.O.U. Checklist no 422— Colorado Records— Drew 81, p. 140; 82, 

 p. 182 ; Morrison 89, p. 145 ; Bendire 92, p. 175 ; Cooke 97, p. 86. 



