HEBOniONES: HERONS AND THEIR ALLIES. 



647 



VIII. Order HERODIONES: Herons and their Allies. 



J 



Altridal Grallatores : including the Herons, Storks, 

 Ibises, Spoonbills, and related birds. The species 

 average of large size, some standing among the tall- 

 est of Carinate birds, with compressed body and ex- 

 tremely long neck and legs. The neck has usually 

 15-17 vertebrae, and is capable of very strong flexion 

 in S-shape. The tibiae are naked below ; the podo- 

 theca varies; The general pterylosis is peculiar, in 

 the presence, in central groups of this order, of 

 powder-down tracts, and in some other respects. The 

 oil-gland is present, and tufted. A part if not the 

 whole of the head is naked as a rule, as much of 

 the neck also frequently is. The toes, usually long 

 and slender, are never fully webbed. The hallux is 

 more or less lengthened, and either little elevated, or 

 else perfectly insistent. A foot of iusessorial character 

 results ; the sJDecies ft-equently perch on trees, where 

 the nest is usually placed. The physiological nature 

 is altricial and usually psilopsedic ; the young hatch- 

 ing naked, unable to stand, and being fed in the nest. 

 The food is fish, reptiles, mollusks, and other auimal 

 matters, generally procured by spearing with a quick 

 thrust of the bill, given as the birds stand in wait, 

 or stalk stealthily along ; hence they are sometimes 

 called Gradatores (stalkers). The bill normally rep- 

 resents the ' ' cultrirostral " pattern ; it is as a rule of 

 lengthened wedge shape, hard and acute at end if not 

 hard throughout, with sharp cutting edges; enlarging 

 regularly to the base where the skull contracts gradu- 

 ally in sloping down to meet it ; but deviations from 

 such typical shape are frequent and striking. It is 

 firmly affixed to the skull, and always longer than the 

 head. The nostrUs are small, elevated, surrounded 

 by bone and a horny sheath, with little if any soft 

 skin. The wings normally show a striking difference 

 from those of Limicolm, in being long, broad, and ample. The tail is short and few-feathered, 

 usually having 12 rectrices. 



The cranial characters, though varying to some extent, agree in several important respects. 

 The palatal structure is desmognathous, but without keel along line of junction; the maxillo- 

 palatinos are large and spongy. The nasal bones are typically holorhinal ; schizorhinal in 

 Ihides ; in which, also, the angle of the mandible is produced and recurved, being normally 

 truncate. The sternum is ample, once or twice notched on each side behind. The cervical 

 vertebrae are numerous ; usually 15-17. The trachea and bronchi present some remarkable 

 dispositions, but here and there only, such conformations being therefore not characteristic of 

 the order. The carotids are double (in Botaurus (fig. 93) unique, as far as known, in uniting at 

 once). An intestinal ccecum or two cceca, present. Difiierent genera vary in the classificatory 

 muscles of the leg, the ambiens, femoro-caudal, and its accessory being present or absent- 



Fig. 453. — The Bittern's Bog. (From 

 Michelet.) 



