BIRDS OF NORTH AND MIDDLE AMERICA. 763 



^ICCABA VIRGATA VIRGATA (Cassin). 



CASSIN'S OWL. 



Lighter phase. 

 Adults (sexes alike). — General color of upper parts deep to dark 

 grayish brown, broken by irregular transverse small mottlings, spots 

 or zigzag bars of light grayish buffy and irregular vermiculations of 

 dusky, but varying greatly in the distinctness of these markings, 

 the general surface sometimes nearly uniform dusky except for the 

 pale brown or buffy mottlings or irregular bars; outer webs of exterior 

 scapulars for greater part ochraceous-buff, or white more or less suf- 

 fused with buff, margined or mottled terminally with blackish, and 

 margmed along inner side by a blackish shaft-streak; outermost 

 middle wiag-coverts usually with large, irregular spots of buffy or 

 pale tawny; secondaries and proximal primaries dusky banded with 

 mottled light grayish brown, the dusky interspaces mottled with 

 lighter toward edges; longer primaries with the paler bands much 

 paler (buffy or whitish) and mostly immaculate on proximal half or 

 more of the quills, and margined on each side by a more or less dis- 

 tinct line of dusky; tail blackish brown or brownish black, crossed by 

 four bands of mottled gray, or gray and white (white alwa5^s pre- 

 dominating on inner webs) and rather broadly tipped with white or 

 mottled gray and white ; ''eyebrows" (superciliary region) pale brown- 

 ish buffy, the feathers margined or tipped with dark sooty brown ; lores 

 dull pale grayish buffy to dull brownish white, with bristly shafts black, 

 except toward base ; auricular and suborbital regions pale buffy brown, 

 mottled with dusky and mth paler shaft-streaks, to dark sooty 

 brown or dusky narrowly streaked with pale brownish buffy or dull 

 buffy whitish; facial margin or rim brownish buffy to buffy whitish 

 more or less spotted or flecked with dusky, from behind middle 

 of ears downward; center of throat brownish, streaked or otherwise 

 variegated with dusky; rest of under parts dull cinnamon-buff (the 

 exposed surface of feathers on sides, flanks, etc., paler (sometimes 

 dull whitish), deepening into buffy cinnamon on legs, each feather 

 of sides and flanks and sides of abdomen, sometimes also those of 

 median portion of breast and chest, with a broad, linear, streak 

 •or stripe of blackish brown or dusky; sides of breast and chest usually 

 with coarse transverse mottlings of dark sooty brown; legs more or 

 less mottled transversely (usually rather sparsely) with brown or 

 dusky; under tail-coverts immaculate pale buff to buffy white, the 

 longer coverts sometimes with indistinct mottlings or streaks of 

 brown or dusky on distal portion; bill light dull yellowish ; iris brown; 

 toes dull brownish in dried skins, olive or olive-yellowish in life. 



Darker phase. 

 Similar to the lighter phase, as described above, but ground color of 

 under parts wholly buffy cinnamon; or, whole chest and breast 



