212 BULLETIN 16 7, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Food. — The food of this hawk is much like that of other red- 

 shouldered hawks. It seldom attacks poultry hut lives mainly on 

 small mammals, snakes, and frogs. It has been recorded as killing 

 iBome birds, such as quail, cardinals, and various sparrows. Its feed- 

 ing habits are mainly beneficial. 



BUTEO ALBONOTATUS Kaup 

 ZONE-TAILED HAWK 



HABITS 



The zone-tailed hawk is a Central American species that reaches the 

 northern limit of its range in our Southwestern States. My ac- 

 quaintance with it is limited to a brief visit to two of the picturesque 

 canyons of the Catalina Mountains in Arizona. After a long drive 

 over the rolling plains east of these mountains, we dipped down a 

 sharp decline into Apache Canyon, where we pitched camp for a few 

 days. This is one of the most picturesque canyons in Arizona. It is 

 a broad, deep, rocky canyon, well watered by a stream of good clear 

 water flowing over a wide stony bed. The sides of the canyon are 

 rough and rocky, in some places very steep or even precipitous, and 

 more or less overgrown with small giant cactus, hackberries, thorns, 

 mesquite, and mountain misery. In the steep rocky walls are nu- 

 merous small caves, crevices, and ledges where we found nests of 

 the turkey vulture, golden eagle, raven, and canyon wren. The broad 

 bed of the stream is heavily wooded with large picturesque sycamores 

 and giant cottonwoods, with lofty spreading branches that reminded 

 me of New England elms, towering over the tops of the other trees, 

 including a variety of oaks, maples, and walnuts. In one of these big 

 cottonwoods near our camp was an apparently new hawk's nest, fully 

 100 feet from the ground, about which a pair of zone-tailed hawks 

 showed considerable concern (pi. 61). Our companion, Frank C. 

 Willard, told us that formerly there were two pairs of these hawks 

 in this canyon, but we could not locate the second pair. We did, 

 however, locate two pairs of Cooper's hawks and two pairs of western 

 redtails with nests in the lofty treetops. Perhaps the redtails had 

 driven away the other pair of zonetails. 



Nesting. — The nest near our camp, referred to above, was in the 

 topmost branches of tlie giant cottonwood. It was a difficult and 

 hazardous climb ; and as the hawks had apparently not yet laid, we 

 did not care to attempt it. The next day, April 19, 1922, we explored 

 Edgar Canyon, a few miles farther north in the same mountains. 

 This is a similar canyon but narrower ; it is heavily wooded with large 

 sycamores, cottonwoods, and other trees growing along the rocky 

 bed of the stream and with a dense growth of oaks, maples, walnuts, 

 hackberries, thorns, and mesquites on the drier banks. Wliile we were 



