334 THE ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW. 



No. 128. 



ROUGH-WINGED SWALLOW. 



A. O. L^. No. 617. Stelgidopteryx serripennis (And.). 



Description. — .Idiilt: Warm brownish gray or snuff-brown, including throat 

 and breast : thence passing insensibly below to white of under tail-coverts; wnngs 

 fuscous. Young birds exhibit some rusty edging of the feathers above, especially 

 on the wings, and lack the peculiar, recurved hooks on the edge of the outer 

 primary. Size a little larger than the next. Length 5-00-5.75 ( 127-146.1 ) ; wing 

 4.30 (109.2) : tail 1.85 (47) ; bill from nostril .21 (5.3). 



Recognition Marks. — Medium Swallow size; thn.iat not white; warmish 

 brown coloration, and brownish suffusion below fading to white on belly. It is 

 easy to distinguish between this and the succeeding species if a little care is taken 

 to note the general pattern of underparts. 



Nesting. — Nest, in crevices of cliff's, at end of tunnels in sand banks, or in 

 crannies of bridges, etc. ; made of leaves, grasses, feathers, and the like. — bulky 

 or compact according to situation. E;jgs. 4-8, white. Av. size, .74.x .51 (i8.8x 

 13). Season: May 20-June 5, June 20-July 10; two broods. 



General Range. — I'nited States at large, north to Connecticut, southern On- 

 tario, southern Minnesota, British Columbia, etc., south thru Mexico to Costa 

 Rica. Breeds tliruout LInited States range and south in Mexico. 



Range in Washington. — Sinumer resident, of general distribution, save in 

 moinitains. thrunut the State. ]\Iore common east of the mountains, where it 

 has taken a great fancy to banks of irrigating ditches, especially where abrupt. 



Migrations. — S/^ring: First week in April; Tacoma, April 3, 1905, April 6, 

 1906 and 1908. I'al!:c. Sept. i. 



Authorities. — Cotyle serripennis. Bonap. Baird, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv. IX. 

 pt. II. 1858, 314. C&S'. L-( ?). L-\ Rh. Ra. J. B. E. 



Specimens.— (U. of W.) Prov. P. B. E. 



IT not infrequenth' liapi)ens that some oversight, or want of discrimina- 

 tion, on the part of early observers condemns a species to long obscurity or 

 unending misapjirehension. The Bank Swallow was at once recognized by the 

 pioneer naturalists of America as being identical with the well-known 

 Etiropean bird, but it was not till 1838 that Audulion distinguished its super- 

 ficially similar but structurally different relative, the Rough-wing. The cloak 

 of obsctiritv still clings to the latter, altho we begin to suspect that it may 

 from the first have enjoyed its present wide distribution East as well as W^est. 

 Hence, in describing it, we take the more familiar Bank Swallow as a point 

 of departure, and say that it differs thus and so and so. 



In the first place it lias those curious little booklets on the edge of the 

 wing (es]iecially on the outer edge of the first primary ) — nobody knows what 

 thev are for. Thev stirelv cannot be of serx'ice in enabling the bird to cling to 



