BIRDS OF NORTH AND MIDDLE AMERICA 527 



Nidification. — Nest variously situated (usually on trees or rocks 

 near water), exceedingly bulky, composed largely of large sticks. 

 Eggs two to four, broadly ovate, boldly blotched or spotted with 

 chestnut, madder brown (sometimes blackish brown) and purplish 

 gray on a buffy white to cinnamon-buff ground color. 



Range. — Nearly cosmopolitan but absent in colder regions, New 

 Zealand, and parts of Polynesia. (Monotypic, but represented by 

 several geographic forms or subspecies.) 



KEY TO THE AMERICAN FORMS OF PANDION 



a. A solid heavy fuscous-black band from the eye to the sides of the breast. 

 b. Feathers of upperparts of the bodj^ dark brown, not edged with white. 

 c. Breast usually unmarked white like the rest of the underparts (some- 

 times with a few narrow streaks) (North America generally). 



P. haliaetus carolinensis, ad. cf (p. 527)" 

 cc. Breast and lower throat with dusky brownish shaft streaks or marks. 



P. haliaetus carolinensis, ad. ? (p. 529) 

 66. Feathers of upperparts of body distinctly edged with white. 

 c. Breast with brownish streaks or marks. 



P. haliaetus carolinensis, juv. ? (p. 529) 

 cc. Breast with no or verj^ few and faint streaks or marks. 



P. haliaetus carolinensis, juv. cf (p. 529) 

 aa. No solid heavy fuscous postocular band, but merely a few dark streaks. 



6. Back dark clove brown, sepia, or fuscous; inner lesser upper wing coverts 

 (along bend of wing) dark brown edged with ashy fulvous (Bahama 



Islands) P. haliaetus ridgwayi, ad. (p. 541) 



66. Back hair brown with a fulvous cast to grayish sepia; inner lesser upper 

 wing coverts (along bend of wing) almost pure buffy white. 



P. haliaetus ridgwayi, juv. (p. 541) 



PANDION HAUAETUS CAROLINENSIS (Gmelin) 



American Osprey 



Adult male. — Forehead, crown, occiput, and nape white, washed 

 to a varying degree with pale cinnamon-buff, the latter color often 

 present as definite flecks on the hind crown, occiput, and nape; 

 the anterior portion of the crown and the middle of the nape heavily 

 marked with fuscous-black; lores bare, blackish; scapulars, inter- 

 scapulars, enthe back, rump, upper wing and tail coverts, and remiges 

 varying from dark sepia to clove brown to fuscous-black, the lesser 

 upper wing coverts and the interscapulars and anterior scapulars 

 (in folded wing) generally slightly darker than the rest of the upper- 

 parts, all the feathers narrowly and faintly margined with fulvous; 

 the long tips of the five outermost primaries generally darker, more 

 fuscous-black, than the rest of the remiges; the primaries internally 



"* The European race Pandion h. haliaetus (Linnaeus) is very similar to P. h. 

 carolinensis but has the lower throat and breast streaked with dusky in both sexes 

 and is slightly smaller. 



