352 FALCONID^J ACCIPITER 



ants and beetles and is very destructive to the farmer's chickens ; 

 the nest is built of sticks and is placed in a thick fir tree on a 

 horizontal forked branch. 



Two eggs in the South African Museum, -found at Mulders Vlei 

 near Stellenbosch, are bluish-white covered with yellowish-brown 

 stains, probably of blood. They measure 1-70 x T45. 



541. Accipiter ovampensis. Ovampo Sparrow Hawk. 



Accipiter ovampensis, Gurneif, Ibis, 1875, p. 867, pi. 7 ; Sharpe, ed. 

 Layard's B. S. Afr. p. 796 (1884) ; Shelley, B. Afr. i, p. 132 (1896) ; 

 Marshall, Ibis, 1900, p. 256 [Mazoe] ; Beichenoiv, Vog. Afr. i, p. 560 

 (1901). 



Description. Adult male. Upper surface dark ashy-grey paler 

 on the sides of the neck ; feathers of the nape with white bases and 

 upper tail- coverts with a pure white spot about the middle of each 

 feather ; primaries greyish-brown barred with darker brown, below 

 the notch the paler intervals are white on the inner web and on the 

 lower surface they are white throughout, the secondaries have less 

 distinct markings ; tail transversely marked, four dark bars alter- 

 nating with four paler bars, the tips white, a white spot in the 

 centre of the paler bars includes a portion of the shaft, which is also 

 white ; the under tail-coverts and tail below are white, the latter 

 traversed by five dark bars ; the rest of the under surface is white 

 with narrow transverse bars of grey, narrowest on the throat. 



Length 13'5 ; wing 9-2; tail 6-5; tarsus 1-7; culmen without 

 cere 0-55. 



An immature female is dark brown above, the feathers of the 

 head and neck broadly margined with white ; some of the feathers 

 of the inner secondaries and back tinged with rufous ; tail with five 

 darker bands above, six below ; on the paler interspaces only the 

 shafts of the feathers are white ; below, throat and under tail-coverts 

 white ; upper breast with brown shaft marks, rest of the under parts 

 transversely barred, but the bars wider apart than in the adult 

 and slightly sagitate ; under wing-coverts white transversely barred 

 with brown at narrow intervals. 



Length 15-5 ; wing 10-4 ; tail 7'6 ; tarsus 2-1 ; culmen without 

 cere 0-6. 



This bird, the description of which has been compiled from 

 Gurney's original account, bears in its markings a remarkable re- 

 semblance to Astur polyzonoides, from which it differs in the absence 



