40 Birds of Buzzard's Roost 



rear on the perch, and this enables them to grasp their prey 

 with great certainty. They are birds of prey, usually are night 

 prowlers, and like the cat surprise their victims by watchful- 

 ness and stealth. In this they are much assisted by their plum- 

 age which is singularly soft and downy, and the construction of 

 their wing feathers of which Ernest Ingersoll says, "the stems 

 and delicate horny sprays constituting the vanes of the feathers 

 are not rigid and firmly hooked together, but are slender, loose, 

 and flexible, so that their flight is noiseless. There is no swish 

 or whist of wings as they pass, yet they have great speed and 

 agility in the air, though lacking power for long sustained ef- 

 fort w T hich is not required in their manner of life." Another 

 interesting fact stated by Mr. Ingersoll is that "the owls not 

 only have the internal part of the ear relatively of great size, 

 but the external opening is ample, and so developed by a ridge 

 of skin and a growth of enclosing feathers as really to form a 

 conch or external ear not elsewhere to be seen among the 

 birds." 



The bill of the adult male great horned owl is large, black 

 and strong; eyes very large and golden yellow; the horns are 

 about three inches long and very broad, the feathers compos- 

 ing them being edged with bright tawny; face rusty, bounded 

 on each side with black; space between the eyes and bill whit- 

 ish ; upper parts finely pencilled with dusky on a tawny whitish 

 ground; tail rounded, extending about an inch beyond the 

 tips of the wings, crossed with six or seven bars of brown, and 

 variegated or marbled with brown and tawny ; chin pure white, 

 under that a band of brown, succeeded by another one of 

 white ; whole lower parts elegantly marked with numerous 

 transverse bars of dusky, on a bright tawny ground, thinly in- 

 terspersed with white ; vent pale yellow ochre, barred with nar- 

 row lines of brown ; legs short, heavy and well covered with 

 feathers of a pale brown color; talons very strong, and of a 

 blue black color. The adult female is larger than the male, 

 but in general appearance they are alike. Except the great 

 gray owl, they are the largest and most powerful of the Amer- 

 ican owls. 



They are residents and breed throughout most of their 

 range, which extends throughout eastern North America, 



