500 SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS.— RAPTORES — ACCIPITRES. 
A. ferrugineus is highly distinctive of the lat Length of a Q, 22.00; extent 54.00; wing 
17.50; tail 9.00; iris light brown; bill mostly blackish-blue, cere pale greenish-yellow, feet 
dull yellow, claws blue-black. This is about an average size; the § averages smaller; wing 
about 16.00, ete. The name adopted, it must be observed, is not intended to discriminate the 
black from the ordinary plumage, but to separate the American bird subspecifically from the 
European. N. Am., at large, common, especially in fertile, well-watered regions, as those of 
FIG. 382. — Rough-legged Buzzard, } nat. size. (From Brehm.) 
the Atlantic seaboard ; a large, heavy, and somewhat sluggish hawk, haunting meadows and 
marshes, to some extent crepuscular in habits, of low, easy, and almost noiseless flight ; prey- 
ing upon insignificant quarry, particularly small rodent and inseectivorous mammals, reptiles, 
batrachians and insects. Nest usually in large trees, but frequently on a ledge of rocks or the 
edge of a cut-bank ; a bulky mass of interlaced sticks, with softer matted material of miscel- 
laneous kinds; eggs 3-5, laid late in May and in June, measuring 2.10-2 25 in length, by 
1.75-1.80 in breadth; varying in color from dingy whitish with scarcely any marking, or but 
