198 BURROWING OAVL. 



small and incomplete, and the outer edges of the primaries not recurved ; 

 but it differs from them in not having the tarsus and toes covered by long 

 thick feathers. 



The Burrowing Owl is nine inches and a half long, and two feet in 

 extent. The bill is horn color, paler on the margin, and yellow on the 

 ridges of both mandibles ; the inferior mandible is strongly notched on 

 each side : the capistrum before the eyes terminates in black rigid bristles, 

 as long as the bill : the irides are bright yellow. The general color of 

 the plumage is a light burnt-umber, spotted with whitish, paler on the 

 head and upper part of the neck ; the lower part of the breast and 

 belly are whitish, the feathers of the former being banded with brown : 

 the inferior tail coverts are white immaculate. The wings are darker 

 than the body, the feathers being much spotted and banded with whitish ; 

 the primaries are five or six banded, each band being more or less widely 

 interrupted near the shaft, and margined with blackish, which color 

 predominates towards the tip ; the extreme tip is dull whitish ; the shafts 

 are brown above, and white beneath : the exterior primary is finely 

 serrated and equal in lengtli to the fifth, the second and fourth being 

 hardly shorter than the third, which is the longest. Tlie tail is very 

 short, slightly rounded, having its feathers of the same color as the 

 primaries, and like them five or six banded, but more purely white at 

 tip. The feet are dusky, and remarkably granulated, extending, when 

 stretched backwards, an inch and a half beyond the tail ; the tarsi are 

 slender, much elongated, covered before and on each side witli loose webbed 

 feathers, which are more thickly set near the base, and become less 

 crowded towards the toes, where they assume the form of short bristles ; 

 those on the toes being altogether setaceous, and rather scattered. The 

 lobes beneath the toes are large and much granulated ; the nails are 

 black and rather small, the posterior one having no groove beneath. 



The individual we have described is a male, and no difference is ob- 

 servable in several other specimens : the female differs in nothing except 

 that her eyes are of a pale yellow color. 



