224 THE BIRDS OF MAINE 



An old Crow's nest or some other deserted nest of a large 

 bird is usually selected and patched up a little. Three to six, 

 usually four or five eggs are laid and these are pale bluish 

 white, sometimes unspotted, or often slightly and occasionally 

 very heavily and handsomely spotted and scrawled with brown, 

 drab and lavender. A majority of the eggs are only very 

 slightly or not at all spotted. 



Four eggs which were in an old Crow's nest thirty-five feet up 

 in a spruce tree at Lancaster, New Hampshire, May 12, 1896, 

 measure 1.88 x 1.53, 1.90 x 1.53, 1.93 x 1.53, 1.90 x 1.55. The 

 young are covered with a white down soon after hatching. 

 Usually, even in the southern portion of its range only one 

 brood is reared, but if robbed the birds will lay again and 

 again until they succeed in hatching their young. 



Subgenus ASTUR Lacepede. 



334. Accipiter atricapUlus (Wils.). American Goshawk. 



Plumage of adults : a white line over the eye ; head blackish ; upper parts 

 bluish slate color ; outer tail feathers somewhat fuscous, and marked with 

 darker ; tail whitish at tip ; the throat and breast streaked with darkish and 

 all under parts with irregular wavy bars of grayish and whitish. Immature 

 plumage: fuscous above, the feathers with rufous margins; primaries black 

 barred ; tail brownish gray with dark bars ; below whitish with black streaks 

 or spots. Wing of male 12.00 to 13.00; wing of female 13.00 to 14.00; tarsus 

 2.80. 



Geog. Dist. — Northern and eastern North America ; breeding from northern 

 tier of States, in Canadian fauna, northward ; wintering south to the Middle 

 States and southern Rocky Mountain region ; accidental in England. 



County Records. — Androscoggin ; common migrant, (Johnson). Cmnber- 

 land ; common, have taken its eggs here, (Mead) ; uncommon October to 

 May, (Brown, C. B. P. p. 22). Franklin; rare summer resident, (Swain). 

 Hancock; rare summer resident, common some winters, (Knight). Ken- 

 nebec; (Gardiner Branch). Knox; winter, (Rackliff). Oxford; breeds 

 rarely, (Nash). Penobscot ; common some winters, rather rare as a summer 

 resident but found breeding several times here, (Knight). Piscataquis; 

 common resident, (Homer). Sagadahoc; scattering, fall and spring, (Spin- 

 ney). Somerset ; rare visitant, (Morrell) ; rare summer resident of northern 

 county, (Knight). Waldo; not infrequent some winters, (Knight). Wash- 

 ington; not uncommon, breeds, (Boardman). York; (Adams). 



