RAPTORES: BIRDS OF PREY. 



617 



and the Indian Territory. But it would seem that if the cruel and wanton slaughter to which 

 tlie gentle creatures are subjected by idlers goes on, iliey must before long be exterminated. 

 Gregarious, frugivorous, and granivorous ;. not regularly migratory, but roving and sporadic. 

 Said to breed in companies in hollow trees ; also to build open nests on horizontal boughs of cy- 

 press ; eggs white, 1.40 X 1-0.5, variable in shape, rough in texture; normal number and time 

 of laying unknown ; in captivity '3-.T, June-September. 



RHYNCHOPSIT'TA. (Gr. pvy^os, hrugchos, beak, and y^iTra, piiitta, for ■^irraKr), yj/irraKos, 

 or (TiTTaKTj, psittace, psittakos, or sittace, a parrot.) Beakeu Parrots. Bill very larije, 

 compressed, with flat gonys and long hook of upper mandible. Cere densely feathered, as in 

 the foregoing, the nostrils in the feathers. Tail cuueate, graduated on(^-third its length. Size 

 large. One Mexican species. 



R. pachyrhyn'cha. (Gr. naxvs, paclius, thick; and piy-j^os-) Thick-billed Parrot. 

 Green, brightest on cheeks and ears ; spot before eye and under surface of quills and tail- 

 feathers blackish; primary under coverts yellow; forehead, lores, line over eye, edge and bend 

 of wings, and thighs, dark red ; bill black ; feet dark. Young simply green, with little if any 

 red or yellow, and the bill whitish for the most part. Length lG.00-17.00; wing about 10.00; 

 tail about 7.00, graduated 2.50; bill 1.50 along chord of culmen, rather more in depth. High- 

 lands of Mexico, north casually to the Chiricahua mountains, Arizona; specimen in Miis. 

 Acad. Phila. labelled Rio Grande, J. W. Audubon, Baird, B. N. A. 18.58, p. 66; sup- 

 posed to jiave occurred in S. W. Texas and S. New Mexico, Ridgw. Man. 1887, p. 269; 

 not previously admitted in the Key ; A. 0. U. Hypothetical List, 1886, p. .'^54 ; 1895, 

 p. 330, No. 16. 



Order RAPTORES: Birds of Prey. 



Bill epignathous, cered; feet not zggodacti/lous. Rapacious birds (Ropfores, Raptatores or 

 Acdpitres of authors, Aetomorphcc of Huxley) form a fairly natural assemblage, to which this 



expression furnishes a clew. 



(Parrots, probably the only other 

 birds with strongly hooked and ^-2 



truly cered bill, are yoke-toed.) ^ 1 



Raptores present several osteo- -^^^ g^ .J 



logical and other anatomical ^^^t ^ 



characters. Sternum ample and *^^=^ -^^^" 

 deep keeled, its posterior margin 

 doubly or singly notched or fe- 

 nestrate on each side, or entire 

 with central emargination ; fur- 

 culum anchylosed or not. Angle 

 of mandible not recurved ; max- 

 illo-palatines united to an ossified 

 septum ; rostrum arched and 

 hooked ; basipterygoids present 

 or absent; skull desmognathous 

 (after a fashion) and holorliinal. 

 Hallux always present, usually 

 valid and insistent; outei* toe re- 

 versible in some cases, never per- ''"■ '-' ~ "•"" '^ ^ ""■' " i""'>- '"'■'"" Mi. n.. i 

 manently reversed. Ambiens present (except in Strigen); biceps s[i|) absent; nil excepting 

 Gijpogeranidca and some CathdilitU's possess the fcinorocaudal. but not its accessory, nor tin- 



