729 



FALCON1D;E. 



FALCONID^E. 



733 



with blackish-blue and gray-blue ; tail with three bands of blackish- 

 brown, at unequal distances ; throat yellowish-white, with brown 

 spots ; neck and belly marked with triangular brown spots on a 

 whitish ground ; cere deep ash ; interior of beak, iris, and feet, yellow. 

 Length about two feet. 



Head and foot of IIoncT-Buzxard (Tcntis 



Female and Young. Ashy-blue on the forehead only ; front of the 

 neck marked with great spots of bright brown ; breast and belly 

 yellowish-red with deeper spots; under surface of the body often 

 whitish, with reddish-brown spots. 



Young of the Year. Cere yellow ; iris bright brown ; head spotted 

 with white and brown ; under part of the body reddish-white, with 

 great brown spots ; feathers of the upper parts bordered with reddish. 

 (Temminck.) 



The Honey-Buzzard feeds on field-mice, moles, mice, hamsters, 

 birds, reptiles, wasps, and other insects. (Temminck.) " Examina- 

 tions," says Mr. Yarrell in his ' British Birds," " have usually proved 

 the food to have been the larva; of bees and wasps, to obtain which 

 the receptacles containing them are scratched out and broken up in 

 the manner described by Sir William Jardine. In one instance, in 

 the case of a honey-buzzard kept in confinement, I was told that it 

 killed and ate rats, as well as birds of considerable size, with great 

 ease and good appetite." The same author records that the stomach 

 of a specimen killed in the north of Ireland and examined by Mr. 

 Thompson of Belfast, contained a few of the larvicand some fragments 

 of perfect coleopterous insects ; several whitish-coloured hairy cater 

 pillars ; the pupa) of a species of butterfly, and also of the six-spot 

 hornet-moth. Willughby says, " In the stomach and guts of that we 

 dissected we found a huge number of green caterpillars of that sort 

 called (feometrrt, many also of the common green caterpillars and 

 others." White's specimen had in its stomach limbs of frogs, and 

 many gray snails without shells. Willughby says tLat it runs very 

 swiftly like a hen. Vieillot states that it seldom flics, except from 

 one tree to another, or from bush to bush, and then always low, and 

 that it runs on the ground with great rapidity like the common fowls. 

 Neat on a lofty tree in a wood or forest. White mentions one on a 

 tall slender beech near the middle of Selborne Hanger. Willughby 

 says, " It builds its nest of small twigs, laying upon them wool, and 

 tupon the wool its eggs. We saw one that made use of an old kite's 

 nest to breed in, and that fed its young with the nymphae of wasps; 

 for in the neat we found the combs of wasps' neats, and in the 

 stomachs of the young the limbs and fragments of wasp-maggots. 

 There were in the nest only two young ones, covered with white 

 down spotted with black. Their feet were of a pale yellow, their 

 bills between the nostrils and the head white ; their craws large, in 

 which were lizards, frogs, &c. In the crop of one of them we found 

 two lizards entire, with their heads lying towards the bird's mouth, 

 as if they sought to creep out." The same author says that the eggs 

 are cinereous, marked with darker spots. The egg mentioned by 

 White was smaller and not so round as those of the common Buzzard, 

 dotted at each end with small red spots, and surrounded in the middle 

 with a broad blood-red zone. Pennant mentions two blotched over 

 with two shades of red, somewhat darker than thos^ of the Kestrel. 



" The eggs of the Honey-Buzzard," writes Mr. Yarrell, " are rare ; I 

 have only seen three or four specimens, one of which answered to the 

 description given by White, the colouring-matter being confined to a 

 broad band round the middle. One specimen in my collection 

 resembles those mentioned by Pennant, being mottled nearly all over 

 with two shades of orange-brown : long diameter 2 inches 1 line ; 

 transverse diameter 1 inch 9 lines." 



This bird is found in oriental countries ; it is very rare and acci- 

 dental in Holland ; more abundant in France iu the Vosges and in 

 the south, a bird of passage (Temminck). Denmark, Norway, Sweden, 

 Russia, Germany, France, Italy, and the south of Europe generally 

 (Yarrell and authors by him quoted). Skins received from India 

 (Gould). In Britain the bird has been obtained in Suffolk, Norfolk, 

 and along the eastern coast as far north as Northumberland, and in 

 several western counties, including Dorsetshire, Devonshire, and 

 Worcestershire. Rare in Cumberland, according to Dr. Heysham, 

 who had only met with one specimen, and was told that it bred in the 

 woods at Lowther. Mr. Thompson mentions one killed in the north 

 of Ireland, and Mr. Macgillivray two as having occurred in Scotland. 

 Buffon and others, Belon among the rest, say that it gets very fat in 

 winter and is then good eating. 



uteo (of Authors). Beak moderate, rather weak ; nostrils some- 

 what rounded ; tarsi short ; acrotarsia scutellated ; fourth quill 

 longest. 



Mr. Vigors remarks that the true Buzzards are known by their 

 comparatively feeble bill, their short tarsi, and scutellated acrotarsia. 

 Their nares are round and their fourth quill-feather the longest. 

 Their tarsi are either plumed to the toes or half way covered with 

 feathers. Of those whose tarsi are completely feathered, F. lagopus 

 of Linnseus is the type, according to Mr. Vigors, and F. desertorum, 

 of Daudin appears to appertain to it ; of those birds whose tarsi are 

 but half plumed he gives Buteo vulgans, the Common Buzzard, as an 

 example, and remarks that the genus is very numerous in spccies ; and 

 that the form is very generally to be observed over the globe. 



B. vulgarie, Falco Buteo of Linnicus ; Buteo of Gesner ; Falco varic- 

 gatut of Gmelin ; F. glaucopis of Men-em ; La Buse of the French ; 

 Falco Bottaone and Pojana of the Italians ; Mause-Falk and Wald- 

 Geyer of the Germans ; Quidfogel of the ' Fauna Suecica ;' Oerne 

 Falk of Brunnich ; and Bod Teircaill of the Welsh. " The whole 

 length of the Common Buzzard is from 20 to 22 inches, depending 

 on the sex the females, as in the Falconidce generally, being the 

 largest. ^ From the habit of seeking food late in the evening, observed 

 in this species, and also hi the Rough-Legged Buzzard, and in the 

 softer and more downy texture of the feathers, as compared with the 

 plumage of the true Falcons, the Buzzards are considered as indicating 

 an approach to the Owls. The beak is bluish-black, darkest in colour 

 towards the point ; the cere yellow ; the irides generally yellow ; but, 

 as the Common Buzzard and indeed all the Buzzards are subject to 

 considerable variation in the colour of their plumage, the irides are 

 observed to vary also, presenting some reference to the prevailing 



Common Buzzard (Ilittro vtiJt/aris}. 



tone of the colour of the feathers. The upper part of the head, 

 occiput, and cheeks, pale-brown, streaked longitudinally with darker 

 brown ; the whole of the back, wing-coverts, \ipper tail-coverts, and 

 upper surface of the tail-feathers, dark clove-brown, the latter barred 



