BIRDS OF NOETH AND MIDDLE AMEEICA, 389 



Plumage arid coloration. — Plumage of under parts blended (as to 

 texture) but feathers distinctly outlined by blackish terminal mar- 

 gins; bare orbital space rather narrow, not continued across lores 

 to rictus. Upper parts grayish brown, conspicuously squamated 

 with black, the primaries blackish or blackish and chestnut; under 

 parts whitish or pale grayish vinaceous, more or less barred or 

 squamated with blackish; lateral retrices blackish, with apical 

 portion white; under wing-coverts black or black and cinnamon- 

 rufous. 



Range. — Northern Mexico (including adjacent border of United 

 States) to Nicaragua; Colombia to Venezuela and Brazil. (Two 

 species.) 



The purely American genus Scardafella presents a very close 

 resemblance in form, size, and even coloration to the Indo-Malayan 

 and Australian genus Geopelia Swainson; but the latter possesses 

 fourteen (instead of twelve) rectrices, the tail is strongly graduated 

 (the outer pair of rectrices only a little more than haK as long as the 

 middle pan-), has the outermost primary abruptly attenuated termi- 

 nally, and the feet relatively much stouter." 



KEY TO THE SPECIES AND SUBSPECIES OF SCARDAFELLA. 



a. Smaller (wing 85-96 mm.); outer webs of distal primaries extensively chestnut 

 basally; outer webs of wing-coverts not distinctly (if at all) white; posterior 

 under parts buffy. (Southwestern border of United States to Nicaragua.) 



Scardafella inca (p. 390). 



aa. Larger (wing 96-98 mm.); outer webs of distal primaries wholly black; outer webs 



of wing-coverts distinctly white; posterior imder parts white. {Scardafella 



ridgwayi.) 



b. Black tips to feathers much broader. (Coast district of Colombia and Venezuela.) 



Scardafella ridgwayi ridgv/ayi (extralimital).^ 

 bb. Black tips to feathers much narrower. (Eastern Brazil, south of Amazon River.) 



Scardafella ridgwayi brasillensis (extralimital).c 



a Only the type species, G. striata (Linnseufi), has been examined in this connection. 



b Columba striata (not of Linnaeus) Jacquin, Beitr., 1784, 34, part (Venezuela); 

 Gmelin, Syst, Nat., i, pt. 2, 1789, 788, part (Venezuela). — Columba squamosa (not of 

 Bonnaterre, 1790, nor Temminck, 1811) Taylor, Ibis, 1864, 94 (Ciudad Bolivar, Vene- 

 zuela). — Scardafella squamosa Salvadori, Cat. Birds Brit. Mus., xxi, 1893, 464, part 

 (Valencia, Venezuela; Trinidad) and of other authors ex Venezuela and Trinidad. — 

 Scardafella ridgwayi Richmond, Proc. U. S. Nat. Mus., xviii, no. 1090, Aug. 12, 1896, 

 660 (Margarita I., Venezuela; coll. U. S. Nat. Mus.); Berlepsch and Hartert, Novit. 

 Zool., ix, 1902, 119 (Altagracia, etc., Orinoco Valley, Venezuela; crit.). — S[cardafella] 

 s[quammata] ridgtvayi Hellmayr, No\it. Zool., xv, 1908, 93 (geog. range). 



c Columba squamosa (not of Bonnaterre, 1790) Temminck and Knip, Pigeons, i, 

 fam. eeconde, 1808-11, 127, pi. 59 (Brazil); Pig. et Gallin., 1813, 336, 484.— Chaeme- 

 pelia squamosa Swainson, Zool. Joum., iii, 1827, 361. — Columbina squamosa Gray- 

 List Gallinae Brit. Mus., 1844, 13. — Geopelia squamosa Hartlaub, Syst. Verz., 1844, 

 98; Schlegel, Mus. Pays-Bas, iv, no. 35 (Columbae), 1873, lZ3.—C[hamsepelia] 



