BIRDS OF MINNESOTA. 219 
parts are very distinctly banded transversely, and sometimes 
this color predominates on the back; plumage of the legs and 
toes pure snowy white; bill and claws horn color; irides 
yellow. 
Length (female), 26; wing, 17 to 19; tail, 10. 
Habitat, Northern portions of Northern Hemisphere. 
SURNIA ULULA CAPAROCH (MULLER). (377a.) 
AMERICAN HAWK OWL. 
I have never seen the Hawk Owl in the flesh more than once, 
but I have found it mounted in the collections of local taxider- 
mists many times since my residence in the State. It really 
looks ‘‘more a hawk than an owl,” but its habits of hunting in 
the day-time—notably cloudy, gloomy days—makes it seem so 
more thando itslooks. Its southern migration from its reputed 
arctic home must ‘be considerably into the winter, for all the 
specimens I have known of having been taken have been well 
on towards spring, and in March I believe,—possibly one in 
early April, which is occasionally as much winter as is March. 
As it. breeds in New England, it may doso here. Its food is 
birds and mice principally. None have been reported to me 
as having been seen later than early April, as already inti- 
mated. 
SPECIFIC CHARACTERS. 
Wings rather long; first three quills incised on their inner 
webs; tail long, with its central feathers about two inches 
longer than the outer tarsi, and toes densely feathered; upper 
parts fuliginous-brown, with numerous partially concealed cir- 
cular spots of white on the neck behind, scapulars and wing 
coverts; face grayish white; throat white with longitudinal 
stripes of dark brown; a large brown spot on each side of the 
breast; other under parts with transverse lines or stripes of 
pale ashy-brown; quills and tail brown, ‘with transverse bands 
of white; bill pale-yellowish; irides yellow; color of upper 
parts darker on the head, and the white markings more or less 
numerous in different specimens. 
Length (female), 16 to 17; wing, 9; tail, 7. 
Habitat, Arctic America. 
Note.—The Hawk Owl has come under my eye so often since 
writing the foregoing, that I cannot regard it as really rare 
any longer. I have met with them in November three times in 
eight years, within seven miles of Minneapolis, and found sev- 
eral in the taxidermists’ collections during the same period. 
Ey PE 
