The Broad-Winged Hawk {Buteo piatyptems) 



Synonym, — Broad- winged Buzzard. 



Description. — Adult: Above sooty brown and fuscous, with much ill-con- 

 cealed or hidden white on head, hind neck, wing-coverts, and inner margin of 

 wings; some ochraceous margining of feathers, but less than in the two preced- 

 ing species; wing-quills plain-colored externally; primaries blackening on tips, 

 broadly white on inner webs; the three outer primaries deeply emarginate; tail 

 black with two decided white or light gray bars, besides narrow terminal gray 

 and basal white ; cheeks finely streaked with dusky and fulvous on whitish ground ; 

 throat white narrowly streaked with blackish; remaining under parts whitish or 

 pale fulvous, heavily and widely barred and streaked with yellowish brown or 

 dusky ochraceous ; sometimes nearly solid colored on breast ; lower belly and cris- 

 sum nearly immaculate; shanks sparingly fine-barred; axillars barred, but under 

 surface of wing nearly white, black-tipped; bill dark, or yellow-spotted below; 

 feet yellow; claws black. Immature: Like adult, but tail grayish brown crossed 

 by five or seven narrow dusky bands; under parts white or bufify, streaked and 

 spotted with dusky ; longitudinal pattern more distinct than in adult. Adult male 

 length about 14.00-16.00 (355.6-406.4) ; wings about 10.50 (266.7) ; tail about 6.7b 

 (171.5) ; culmen from cere .75 (19.1) ; tarsus 2.50 (62.5). Female from two to 

 three inches longer and proportioned accordingly. 



Recognition Marks. — Typical Crow size; the white under surface of wing, 

 with black primary tips, affords quickest field recognition mark ; wings rounded ; 

 bird shorter and more compact in build than Accipiter coopcrii, with which it is 

 most likely to be confused. 



Nest, of sticks, in trees ; often a deserted Crow's nest. Eggs, 2-4, bufify white, 

 spotted and blotched with reddish brown or ochraceous. Av. size, 2.00x1.58 

 (50.8x40.1). 



General Range. — Eastern North America from New Brunswick and the 

 Saskatchewan region to Texas and Mexico, and thence southward to northern 

 South America and the West Indies. Breeds throughout its United States range. 



Professor Jones is right in calling this a little-known Hawk in Ohio. Its 

 fondness for the deeper woods, together with its small size, leaves one little 

 opportunity to distinguish it clearly from the more abundant Cooper Hawk on 

 the one hand or the rare Sharp-shin on the other. On only one occasion have I 

 positively identified it in Ohio. On March 5th, 1898, a male bird with black 

 primary-tips contrasting sharply with the white of the remaining under-wing sur- 

 face, flew low overhead as I stood in the street in Oberlin. The bird held a 

 straight course north, and moved with the alternating flap and sail so characteristic 

 of the Buteos. 



According to Dr. William L. Ralph, who has studied the species closely in 

 northern New Work : "When one is driven from its nest it at once utters a shrill 

 call which soon brings its mate to the spot, and together they will keep up their 



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