' i- 

 534 The Roller-like Birds 



in the hand. Curiously enough, it is often found dead in an emaciated 

 condition in the most southern portions of its range, where it is difficult to 

 understand how it could have starved. It usually selects a hollow tree or 

 Woodpecker's hole for a nesting site, but it sometimes makes use of an open 

 nest. The eggs, from four to seven in number, are deposited usually early 

 in April. It takes its common name of Saw-whet from its peculiar rasping 

 call, which resembles the sound produced when a large-toothed saw is being 

 filed. An allied species (C. ridgwayi) has recently been discovered in the high 

 mountains of Costa Rica. 



True Hawk Owls. The next in order and the largest of the group are the 

 true Hawk Owls (Surnia), which take their name from their very Hawk-like 

 appearance and habits. They are also birds of the north, although considerably 

 less boreal in their range than the Snowy Owl. They are birds of medium size, 

 ranging between fifteen and eighteen inches in length, with the whole plumage 

 very hard and compact and quite unlike that of typical Owls. They have rather 

 short wings, a long, graduated tail, and short legs with densely feathered toes, 

 while the head is flat, without ear-tufts, and with a very poorly developed facial 

 disk. In color they are brown above, with the scapulars, wings, and tail more 

 or less spotted and barred with white, while the top of the head, nape, and upper 

 back are dull and blackish mottled; the under parts are white regularly barred 

 with brown, except the face and throat, which are whitish. 



There is but a single species of Hawk Owl which is easily separable into 

 two or three geographical races. The typical form the Hawk Owl par excel- 

 lence (S. ulula) is known by its light color, the white largely prevailing on 

 the top of the head, hind neck, and scapular region, while the bars on the lower 

 surface are narrower and paler. It is found in northern Europe and Asia as 

 far north as Lapland and Kamchatka, wandering south in winter to northern 

 Germany and accidentally to western Alaska. It frequents especially the open 

 places in the woods and plains where there are scattered trees, hunting in day- 

 light as w r ell as in the evening, the brightest sunlight not incommoding it. The 

 eggs, which number six to eight or even ten, are placed in a hollow tree, or often 

 in the boxes placed by the natives for the accommodation of the Ducks. Its 

 food consists mainly of lemmings and mice, with occasional birds, as the Willow 

 Grouse, etc. 



The American Hawk Owl (S. u. caparoch} is a very dark colored geographical 

 race, in which the black or brownish of head, hind neck, and scapular region 

 predominates over the white, and the bars below are broader and darker. It 

 ranges from Alaska, through the central evergreen forest region to Newfound- 

 land, and wanders southward in winter to the northern border of the United 

 States. "The Hawk Owl," says Dr. Fisher, " is strictly diurnal, as much so as 

 any of the Hawks, and like some of them often selects a tall stub or dead -topped 

 tree in a comparatively open place for a perch, where it sits in the bright sunlight 

 watching for its prey. Although its flight is swift and Hawk-like, it has never- 

 theless the soft, noiseless character common to the other Owls. When starting 

 from any high place, such as the top of a tree, it usually pitches downward nearly 



