NUTTALL'S POORWILL 187 



plumage strikingly resembles that of the brown phase of Scops asio 

 kennicottV^ 



Mrs. Florence M. Bailey (1928) says that the young male is "similar 

 to adult male but top of head spotted instead of streaked with black, 

 throat band indistinct, wing coverts and scapulars broadly barred 

 with dusky, and irregularly marked with black; underparts barred 

 with dusky on a brownish buffy ground. Young female: Similar to 

 young male but outer tail feathers tipped with brownish buff instead 

 of white." 



Behavior. — The food, feeding habits, and general behavior of 

 Stephens's whippoorwill are apparently similar to those of its eastern 

 relative. Mr. van Rossem noticed a peculiarity that I have not seen 

 in the eastern bird, of which he writes : "A, to me, surprising circum- 

 stance, was the marked erectability of the feathers above the eyes. 

 Both of the sitting females carried these tufts constantly erect the 

 entire time they were under observation. A male seen from directly 

 in front alternately raised and flattened them. On one previous 

 occasion, when night hunting in El Salvador, I had observed the 

 eastern subspecies (vodferus) to have markedly erectile tufts; in fact 

 until I picked the bird up I was certain that I had shot some small 

 'eared' owl. About 45% from the horizontal was the maximum eleva- 

 tion, though when viewed from directly in front the tufts appear 

 nearly vertical." 



Fall— Mr. Swarth (1904) says that, in the Huachucas, "they seem 

 to remain rather late in the fall, as at the end of August their notes 

 were heard as frequently as ever, and I have a female taken by H, 

 Kimball on September 29, 1895. An adult male secured on August 

 29, 1902, had not yet quite completed its moult." 



PHALAENOPTILUS NUTTALU NUTTALLI (Andubon) 

 NUTTALL'S POORWILL 



HABITS 



Nuttall's poorwill is the best known and the most widely distrib- 

 uted race of this species, occupying a wide range in western North 

 America, from southern Canada to Mexico and from the Great Plains 

 to eastern California. Major Bendire (1895) says of its haunts: 



In some of its habits it differs considerably from the preceding species of 

 this family which are almost entirely confined to the denser woodlands; the 

 Poor-will, however, although frequently found in similar localities, is appar- 

 ently equally as much at home on the open prairie and the almost barren and 

 arid regions of the interior, which are covered only here and there with 

 stunted patches of sage (Artemisia) and other desert plants. The climate does 

 not seem to affect it much, as it inhabits some of the hottest regions of the 

 continent, like Death Valley, in southeastern California, as well as the slopes 



