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166 HAWKS AND HAWK-LIKE BIRDS. 



well as the neck-frill, ruddy ; under parts buffy-white, 

 with ruddy longitudinal streaks. Summer migrant. 



Eggs. — 4—5, usually plain blui.sh-white, occasion- 

 ally with some red-brown blotches ; 1 "7 >< 1 "3 inch 

 (plate 128). 



Nest. — A mere hollow in the ground in moorland, 

 with a lining of dead grass and a border of twigs, 

 placed among gorse or heather ; in the fen country 

 the nest is made of sedges. 



Rather smaller than the Hen-Harrier, Montagu's 

 Harrier is in many ways so similar that it 

 becomes very difficult to distinguish one from the 

 other by any mark Nisible at even a moderate 

 distance. Montagu's Harrier is a spring visi- 

 tant to the south-eastern parts of England, occa- 

 sionally nesting there, but rarely occurring farther 

 north. The Hen-Harrier, on the other hand, is a 

 bird of decidedly northern range. The general colour 

 of Montagu's bird is ashier, that of the Hen-Han-ier 

 bluer; but the decisive test -marks in fully grown 

 males are the plain Avhite thighs and unspotted under 

 parts of the Hen-Harrier, and the streaked white 

 thighs and under parts of Montagu's. In shape the 

 smaller bird is somewhat slimmer, and has relatively 

 longer wings, and conscquentl}- an airier flight. Both, 

 however, being birds of the open, nesting on the 

 ground — preferably in fenny tracts — and seeking 

 their diet of small mammals and reptiles, birds and 

 their eggs, by a low buoyant flight, during which they 

 beat over the ground with equal assiduity, chances 

 of confusion are only too numerous. 



