CHAPTER XX 



THE FALCON-LIKE BIRDS 



(Order Falconiformes) 



|T is a fact well known that among the mammals there are certain 

 groups the so-called carnivores which are especially adapted 

 for preying upon their fellows. Among the birds there are also 

 groups the members of which are fitted in one way or another for 

 an equally rapacious existence, inasmuch as they obtain their entire subsistence 

 from animal life, most of which they pursue and capture alive. The most 

 prominent of these rapacious groups of birds was formerly, and indeed may 

 still conveniently be called, the Raptores, or Birds of Prey. It was divided into 

 two parts, the Diurnal Birds of Prey, or those which mainly seek their food by 

 daylight, as Eagles and Hawks, and the Nocturnal Birds of Prey, typified by the 

 Owls, which secure most of their prey by night. This implied a more or less 

 close relationship between the Eagles, Hawks, and allied forms, and the Owls ; 

 but investigation in recent years has settled pretty conclusively that, beyond the 

 similarity of their adaptation for rapacious life, there is little or no real relation- 

 ship between them. The Owls could not possibly have been derived from exist- 

 ing Diurnal Birds of Prey, nor even from a common ancestor, but appear to 

 find their closest relatives among the Roller-like birds, where they are accord- 

 ingly placed. Their affinities and interrelationships will be fully considered 

 under that group. 



Among the Falcon-like birds the adaptation to a raptorial mode of life has 

 so profoundly modified the skeleton that much of the evidence concerning the 

 origin of the group has been defaced or obscured. According to Beddard, and 

 this is confirmed by Pycraft, both eminent anatomists, it appears that the 

 evidence points to the derivation of this group from the Stork-like birds, not, of 

 course, directly from the modern representatives, but at a point low down on the 

 grume stem, even before the characters common to the diverging branches of Storks 

 and Cranes began to undergo transformation. It is not necessary to go further 

 into this matter at present, but it may be stated that much remains to be done 

 in the way of investigating the skeletal and other characters within this and 

 neighboring groups before the final word can be said. 



The Falcon-like birds are so characteristic in appearance and in general so 

 well known, that they are hardly ever mistaken, even by the most careless ob- 

 server. Typically they are birds of robust size, with powerful wings which enable 

 them to pursue and capture other birds or swift-moving animals of various 



