668 



5 VS TEMA TIC S YNOPSIS. —RAP TORES — A CCIPI TRES. 



ing and tending to merge into bars on tlanks, very sparse or obsolete on crissuni, in maxillary 

 region forming a broad firm moustache ; these markings corresponding with ground color of 

 upper parts. Primaries ashy-brown, with narrow but firm pale edging of outer webs and ends ; 



inner webs regularly marked with 

 white in form of barred indents 

 or circumscribed spots, most nu- 

 merous and regular on the outer 

 few primaries ; the white tinged 

 with fulvous, next to the shafts ; 

 outer web of 1st primary either 

 plain, or with whitish indents as 

 in lanarius; outer webs of sec- 

 ondaries more or less marked 

 with fulvous ; axillars plain dark 

 brown ; lining of wings otherwise 

 white, spotted with dark brown. 

 Tail pale brownish-gray, nearly 

 uniform, but with white tip, and 

 more or less distinct barring or 

 indenting with whitish, especially 

 on lateral feathers, producing a 

 pattern not unlike that of pri- 

 maries. Bill mostly dark bluish 

 horn-color, but its base, and much 

 of under mandible, yellow ; feet 

 yellow. Young birds have more 

 fulvous in the dark ground of the 

 upper parts; are more heavily 

 spotted below, and the white is 

 there tinged with buff or ochrey; 

 feet plumbeous. Size very vari- 

 able : $ about 18.00 ; extent 

 40.00; wing 12.00-13.00; tail 

 7.00-8.00; tarsus about 2.00; 

 middle toe witliout claw about 

 the same ; chtird of culmen, in- 

 cluding cere, 1.00. 9 larger: 

 wing 13.00-14.00 ; tail 8.00-9.00. etc, A noble species, representing the Old World Lanner 

 and Jugger, abundant in western U. S., especially on the Plains; E. occasionally to Illi- 

 nois; S. into Mexico. I have traced it from Montana at lat. 49° to Arizona and 8. California, 

 and found it very numerous in Wyoming, where it is the characteristic species of its genus. 

 In the region first named it was nesting on cliffs, and such is its wont everywhere, in the 

 woodless regions it inhabits, where the faces of cut banks of streams, generally precipitous and 

 often of great height, are the ordinary resorts for nidification for Eagles, Ferruginous and 

 Swainson's Buzzards, and various other Birds of Prey; in forested country, however, the Lanner 

 will sometimes take to a tree. The breeding season is mostly April and May, but extends 

 from March to June. Eggs 3-5, from 2.05 to 2.25 X 1-55 to 1.65, white or creamy-whitish, 

 irregularly but usually thickly clouded, mottled, and blotched with reddish-brown; often 

 with a purplish shade ; thus indistinguishable from those of related species. (F. pohjagrus 

 Cass.) 



Fig. 450. —Lanner Falcon, ', nat. .sizi- ; not distingiiislialile in the cut 

 from the Prairie Falcon. (From Brehm.) 



