l88 MEMOIRS OF THE NUTTALL ORNITHOLOGICAL CLUB. 



85. Buteo platypterus (Vieill.). 

 Broad-winged Hawk. 



Uncommon transient visitor in early autumn, rare in spring and summer. 



SEASONAL OCCURRENCE. 



April ig, 1893, one seen between Waltham and Lincoln, W. Brewster. 



April 25 — September 30. 

 October 2, 1875, one im. female taken,' Belmont, a gunner. 



The Cambridge Region contains few tracts of woodland sufficiently remote 

 and extensive to attract the forest-loving Broad-winged Hawk. Hence this bird 

 is, and indeed has always been, within the period covered by my field experience, 

 the least common of our Buteos. It occurs oftenest during the autumnal mi- 

 grations which begin about the first of September and usually terminate by the 

 middle of October. The Pine Swamp used to be one of its favorite haunts at 

 this season. I have seen it repeatedly in April, May and June on the eastern 

 slope of a wooded ridge that borders the southern end of what is now Hobbs 

 Brook Reservoir, and I believe that it has bred there within recent years. 

 A fine adult male in my collection was perhaps obtained in this locality. It 

 was brought in the flesh to Mr. M. Abbott Frazar on May 8, 1893, by a 

 Waltham gunner, named Harding, who said that he had shot it the day 

 before in Lincoln, and that he had found it sitting on a nest which contained 

 eggs. The ridge just mentioned lies partly in Lincoln and partly in Waltham 

 and it is often visited by Waltham sportsmen. 



The Broad-winged Hawk is of rare and irregular occurrence in summer 

 throughout most if not all of Middlesex County, but it breeds rather commonly 

 in eastern portions of Worcester County, especially in the townships of Har\'ard, 

 Lancaster and Sterling, where my friend, Mr. John E. Thayer, has frequently 

 found it nesting within the past ten or twelve years. He tells me, however, 

 that it is fast disappearing from that portion of the State, probably because of 

 the fact that many of the tracts of woodland which it formerly frequented have 

 been recently devastated by the wood choppers. 



' No. 300, collection of William Brewster. 



