SWAINSON'S HAWK 119 



Cory, C. B., Birds of Illinois and Wisconsin, p. 464, 1909. 



Bruner, L., Wolcott, .R. H., Swenk, M. H., A Preliminary Review of 



the Birds of Nebraska, p. 51, 1909. 

 A. O. U. Check List, 1910, p. 158. 



Chapman, F. M., Birds of Eastern North America, p. 296, 1912. 

 Bunker, C. D., The Birds of Kansas, p. 147, 1913. * 



jGabrielson, Ira N., Some Marshalltown, Iowa, Notes: Auk. XXXI, pp. 



255-6, 1914. 



11. BUTEO SWAINSONI Bonaparte. 342. 

 Sw'ainson's Hawk. Big Chicken Hawk. 



Field Characters. A large brownish hawk with banded tail, white 

 throat and belly, and conspicuous reddish buff breast. 



Description. Above, dusky brown; feathers edged with buff. Tail 

 grayish with many dusky bars. Below, whitish or buffy, with dusky 

 or rusty streaks or spots; the breast conspicuously reddish buff or 

 brownish; the throat white. 



Immature birds with more buff or reddish buff above. Below, 

 light buff with dark streaks and spots. 



Measurements. Length, 20 to 22 inches; wing, 15 to 17 inches; 

 tail, 8 to 10 inches. 



Range. Most of North and South America, breeding in most parts 

 of its North American range. 



During the past twenty years or more, while the writer has exam- 

 ined in the flesh many lowan Raptores, there has never come to hand 

 an adult specimen of Swainson's Hawk. This experience, however, 

 I do not believe to be a fair index to its numbers in the state. Others 

 have been more fortunate, Professor Charles R. Keyes having col- 

 lected a set of eggs May 10, 1892, near Norway, that were laid in an 

 old hawk's nest fitted up and lined with strips of bark, green twigs 

 and feathers, and situated fifty feet up in a white oak. R. M. Ander- 

 son writes, "It is fairly well distributed over Iowa as a migrant and 

 nests from the central to the northern portion of the State. The 

 Swainson's Hawk nests somewhat later than the Red-tail, in the early 

 part of May in northern Iowa. The nest is built in the small rem- 

 nants of native groves, or moderately timbered tracts, and the birds 

 seem quite careless about its concealment. Almost invariably fresh 

 sprigs of green leaves are found in nests containing eggs." 



