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Genus BUTEO. 



Accifiter apud Brisson, Orn. i. p. 406 (1760). 



Falco apud Linnaeus, Syst. Nat. i. p. 127 (1766). 



Buteo, Laeepede, Mem. de l'lnst. in. p. 506 (1800). 



Butaquila apud Hodgson in Gray's Zool. Misc. p. 81 (1844). 



Butaetos apud Moschler, Naumannia, 1853, p. 296. 



Butaetus apud Thienemann, J. fur Orn. 1853, Extrah. p. 105. 



Circaetus apud Strickland, Orn. Syn. p. 46 (1855). 



IAmnosalus apud Herzog Paul Wilhelm von Wiirttemberg, Naumannia, 1857, p. 432. 



The species belonging to the genus Buteo, numbering, according to Mr. Sharpe, eighteen, 

 exclusive of Buteo montanus (which he treats as a subspecies), are found in the Palsearctic, 

 Ethiopian, and Oriental (excepting the Indo-Malayan subregion), the Nearctic, and Neotropical 

 Regions ; but the genus is unrepresented in the Australian Region. Three species only are 

 found in the Western Palsearctic Region. The Buzzards are, as a rule, sluggish, heavy birds ; 

 and, unlike the Falcons, they seldom pursue birds on the wing, but subsist chiefly on such as 

 they can more easily capture, and on small mammals, reptiles, insects, &c. They frequent both 

 wooded and open country, and may frequently be seen seated on some open perch in search of 

 prey, or else circling at some altitude above the grove where the nest is placed. Their cry is a 

 loud, clear, mewing call, which may be heard at a considerable distance. They breed early in the 

 season, and place the nest, which is constructed of sticks and lined with grass or any other soft 

 material, either on a large tree or on a rock. Occasionally, however, they will repair a deserted 

 nest of some other species. Their eggs are white with a pale bluish tinge, and are more or less 

 spotted and blotched with pale violet-grey and deep reddish brown or rufous. 



Buteo vulgaris, the type of the genus, has the beak somewhat slight, decurved from the 

 base, the anterior part of the edge of the upper mandible slightly projecting; nostrils oval, 

 placed in the anterior portion of the cere, which is large ; wings long and wide, the first quill 

 rather shorter than the seventh, the third and fourth nearly equal, the latter being longest, the 

 first four quills deeply notched on the inner web ; tail moderately long, slightly rounded ; 

 tarsus rather short, strong, bare (except on the upper part), scutellate ; toes short ; claws strong, 

 acute, curved. 



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