220 THE BIRDS OF MAINE 



strongly, while at other times they are equally as gilent. I 

 have often fancied that their cries were to scare small game 

 beneath them into moving and thus being betrayed to the sharp 

 eyes of the Hawk. 



In summer they delight to fly in circles high over their 

 marshes, uttering a cry of alarm at the approach of the human 

 intruder and if the nest be near at hand swooping downward 

 in vain attempt to scare the invader away. At times they 

 have an alarm call not greatly different from the peculiar "cutty 

 cutty" some times uttered by a Herring Gull. Their nest of 

 weeds, grass, rushes, and similar material is well made, placed 

 on the ground in a marsh or meadow and concealed quite well 

 by the growth around it. Often a nest will contain fresh or 

 slightly incubated eggs along with others in various stages up 

 to those nearly ready to hatch. Three to five pale bluish white 

 eggs are laid, usually unspotted but occasionally spotted slightly 

 or rarely very heavily with brownish. Four eggs in varying 

 stages of incubation were found at Bangor, June 4, 1892, in 

 a nest in a marsh. These eggs measure, 1.79 x 1.49, 1.89 x 

 1.51, 1.85 X 1.49, 1.86 x 1.53. 



Genus ACCI PITER Brisson. 

 Subgenus ACCIPITER. 



332. Accipiter velox (Wils.). Sharp-shinned Hawk. 



Plumage of adults : above slaty or bluish gray, the primaries beirred with 

 dark ; tail ashy gray with a whitish tip and dark cross bars ; throat whitish 

 with darkish streaks ; underparts transversely barred with pale rufous and 

 white. Immature plumage: upper parts fuscous with rufous margins to 

 feathers ; below whitish, more or less streaked and spotted with blackish or 

 darkish. In all plumages the tail nearly square so that the outer feathers 

 are nearly as long as the others. Wing of adult male 6.00 to 7.00 ; wing of 

 adult female 7.00 to 8.50 ; tarsus of male 1.95 ; tarsus of female 2.12. 



Geog. Dist. — North America; breeds from the southern United States 

 northward ; winters from Massachusetts to Guatemala. 



County Records. — Androscoggin ; common summer resident, (Johnson). 

 Aroostook; not uncommon locally as a summer resident, (Knight). Ciun- 

 berland ; common summer resident, (Mead) ; one seen in Portland several 



