98 BIRDS OF TUNISIA 



vieiruig note. Small mammals and birds form its principal food, but 

 reptiles and insects are also eaten by it, as well as carrion. In 

 captivity it becomes very tame, particularly when taken from the 

 nest. 



BUTEO DESERTORUM (Daudin). 

 AFKICAN BUZZAED. 



Falco desertorum, Baud. Traitc d'Orn. ii, p. 162 (1800). 



Buteo desertorum, Vicill. Nouv. Diet, iv, p. 478 (1816) ; Shaiye, Cat. 



Birds Brit. Mus. i, p. 179 ; Koenig, J. f. 0. 1888, p. 157 ; id. J. f. O. 



1892, p. 346 ; Whitakcr, 1895, p. 103. 

 Buteo ferox, Malherbe, Fauna Orn. de I'Alg. 1855, p. 8. 

 Falco ferox, Malherbe, Faitne Orn. de I'Alg. 1855, p. 8. 

 Falco cirtensis, Malherbe, Fauue Orn. de I'Aly. 1855, p. 8. 

 Buteo cirtensis, Loche, ExjjI. Sci. A!g. Ois. i, p. 44 (1867) ; Erlanger, 



J. f. 0. 1898, p. 408. 



Description. — Adult male, spring, from North Tunisia. 



Head and neck creamy-white, with pale rufous-brown striations ; back, 

 scapulars, rump, and upper wing-coverts light rufous-brown ; primaries 

 blackish-brown; tail pale rufesceut-brown, barred with a darker shade of 

 In-own, the bars on the central pairs of rectrices being almost obsolete ; entire 

 underparts creamy-white, sparsely striped, and chiefly on the thighs, with 

 rufous. 



Iris greyish-brown ; bill blackish ; cere and gape yellow ; feet light 

 yellow. 



Total length 19 inches, wing 1450, culmen 1-35, tarsus 2-70. 



Adult female, similarly coloured, but larger. 



Total length 21 inches, wing 15'25, culmen 1'45, tarsus 3. 



Observations. — Individuals vary considerably in shade of colour, probably 

 according to age. Tunisian examples are, as a rule, much paler than those 

 from Marocco. 



The African Buzzard is considered by some ornithologists to be 

 but a form or subspecies of the Common Buzzard, and there is no 

 doubt there is considerable affinity between the two. On the whole, 

 however, I am inclined to look upon them as specifically distinct, 

 as besides differing greatly from one another in their plumage colora- 

 tion generally, the difference in the marking of the tail appears to 



