324 ROUGH-LEGGED BUZZARD. 



years earlier, and is contrary to the known habits of the bird ; 

 while the assertion by Thomas Edward that the nestlings were taken 

 from a wood near Banff in 1864, is probably as incorrect as many 

 of his other records. 



The Rough-legged Buzzard is the commonest bird of prey in the 

 higher districts of Scandinavia, and — beyond the wooded region — in 

 Russia, nesting in the latter, irregularly, as far south as lat. 56°, as 

 well as in the Baltic Provinces ; while in winter it goes down to the 

 northern shores of the Caspian and to the Asiatic side of the Black 

 Sea. Eastward it breeds in Siberia down to Baikalia and up to 

 Kamchatka ; it is found in Alaska ; and it visits Northern Japan as 

 well as Turkestan during the cold season. AVanderers have occurred 

 as far south as Malta and other islands of the Mediterranean, and 

 the bird is an occasional winter-visitor to the Pyrenees, though 

 only frequent to the north of the Alps and the Carpathians. In 

 North America it is represented by the more rufous and darker 

 B. sancfi-johannis, fondly believed to visit England by owners of 

 deep-coloured examples of the European bird. 



The nest is of large sticks when placed in trees, but when on a crag 

 it is a slighter structure, lined with grass. The 3-5 eggs, often laid 

 by the middle of May, are similar to those of the preceding species, 

 but the average dimensions are a trifle larger and the markings are 

 sometimes still more handsome. This Buzzard feeds, to some extent, 

 on frogs, reptiles and birds, but largely on such small mammals as 

 lemmings, moles and mice ; it can even manage an Arctic hare, and 

 its partiality for rabbits has often proved fatal to it on the warrens 

 of Norfolk and Suffolk. Open or marshy moorlands are more to its 

 taste than wooded districts, in which respect it differs from the 

 Common Buzzard ; its flight is bolder ; and in the air the white on 

 the tail forms a good distinction. By some authorities this and 

 other species with feathered legs have been placed in a separate 

 genus, Archibuteo. 



The adult has the head and neck creamy-white, streaked with 

 rusty-brown ; mantle dark brown ; basal part of the tail white, with 

 a broad brown subterminal bar and several narrower bars on a 

 mottled ground ; under parts huffish, barred with rufous brown, 

 thickly on the abdomen and flanks ; legs feathered to the toes on 

 the front and sides. Length 23-26 in.; wing i7-2-i8-5 in.; the 

 female being larger than the male. The immature bird (represented 

 in the woodcut) is browner in plumage and has less white on the 

 tail ; the under parts are streaked rather than barred with brown. 



