THE MUSEUM. 



189 



sota, P. B. Peabody found several 

 nests of the species during the spring 

 of 1894, I Auk, Januarj', '95. j My first 

 meeting with Krider's Hawk was on 

 the 14th day of May, 1895, when I 

 went out to visit an old nest which had 

 been known to me for about three 

 years and had been occupied by a 

 pair of Swainson's Hawks the previous 

 year. As I came near the tree, a 

 large Hawk flew silently off the nest 

 and away. She perched on a tree at 

 some distance and occasionally uttered " 

 a scream as I was examining the nest, 

 but when I started to climb down, the 

 male Hawk also appeared on the 

 scene, and while he perched on a tree 

 some distance away, the female Hawk 

 circled over my head within easy gun 

 range, screaming angrily, then lit in a 

 tree only two or three rods from the 

 nest and remained there until I had 

 reached terra firma, when she circled 

 once around the tree and alighted 

 again in the same place, only to drop 

 at the report of the double-barrd. 



For some time I thought my speci- 

 men to be only a light phase of the 

 common Red-tail, but after an inspec- 

 tion of a large series of Hawks at the 

 Smithsonian institution and a conver- 

 sation with Mr. Robert Ridgway, I 

 concluded that the bird w-as none other 

 than Krider's Hawk. I afterward sent 

 it to the Smithsonian where the con- 

 clusion was verified, the bird being 

 identified as Biiteo bor calls k rider It; 

 — now at the Smithsonian Institution, 

 accession 30869. This Hawk is much 

 lighter than a Red-tail in my possess- 

 ion, the whole under parts being whit- 

 ish with but a few brown streaks on 

 belly, head .«treaked with dull light- 

 brown and white, cheeks whitish, back 

 and wings considerably mottled with 

 pale and dark-brown and wnitish. 

 The tail was pale reddish brown, fad- 

 ing to a buff or creamy white near 

 base; upper tail coverts white; Iris, 

 brown; feet, light-yellow; cere, pale 

 greenish-yellow. L. 24, W. 15'^, T. 



10^ 



The nest was a large bulky mass of 



sticks; the accumulations of years, 

 and was lined with strips of bark and 

 cornhusks; also containing a sprig of 

 Cottonwood or poplar with fresh green 

 leaves, evidently just picked, and two 

 other sprigs with leaves somewhat 

 withered; built fifty- feet from the 

 ground on a slanting Burr-oak tree. 

 It contained two eggs advanced in in- 

 cubation. The eggs resembled eggs 

 of the common Red-tail, one tgg being 

 sparsely specked with light-brown, the 

 other with a number of large blotches 

 of clear brown, chiefly around the 

 largely end. Size, 2.44 x 194; 2.43 

 X r.91. 



May 2, 1896, in Ellington township, 

 Hancock ccuntj', in company with Mr. 

 Earl Halvorsen, I again found the 

 species "at home." The nest was in 

 a Barr-oak tree, forty-six feet from the 

 ground. The Hawk remained on the 

 nest until I had rapped on the tree 

 several times with a stick, when she 

 flew off, circled around the tree sever- 

 al times and lit on a branch near the 

 nest, in the same tree, before my com- 

 panion had climbed up twenty feet. 

 She sat there for nearly a minute, giv- 

 ing je ornithologists a good view of 

 her. The other Hawk arrived shortly 

 after and they soared overhead utter- 

 ing shrill screams, both Hawks finally 

 settling in the same tree, about two 

 feet apart, and remaining there some 

 time. 



The next, an old one, was about two 

 feet across and built of sticks and one 

 cornstalk. The hollow of the nest 

 was about nine inches across and was 

 lined with strips of bark and a quanti- 

 tiy of fine stringy bark, such as squir- 

 rels' nests are usually lined with. The 

 nest contained a number of White 

 Popular twigs with young green leaves, 

 also a number of bunches of soft white 

 down. The eggs were beautifully 

 marked with umber brown, yellowish 

 brown and lavender and were slightly 

 incubated. 



April 26, 1887, I took a set of three 

 slightly incubated eggs, about two 

 miles north of Forest City, from a nest 



