414 BIRDS — STKIGID^, 



The nest of the Snowy Owl is placed on the ground. The eggs are 

 three ore' our, white, and measure 2.37 by 2. 

 Mr. Read relates : 



" This relic of snperstition was exhibited during the winter of 1851, in a township of 

 Ashtabula county, by a visit of this bird under circumstances well calculated to work 

 upon this feeling. The Ovf 1 came by his usual noiseless flight and perched himself upon 

 a house where lay a corpse, around which the friends had assembled to bear it to its 

 long resting place. On being disturbed it flew direct to the church in which the funeral 

 services were to be held, and behind which lay the graveyard with the open grave. It 

 thus seemed to herald the first victim to the tomb, and many an old lady imagined that 

 the pestilence that w<tlketh at noonday was about to visit that devoted town. The 

 bird, however, was shot and perhaps its power for evil was thereby destroyed." 



Genus SURNIA. Dumeril. 



Size medium. No ear-tufts. Facial disc obsolete. Tarsi and toes densely feathered. 

 Tail long, graduated, 



SuRNIA T3LULA (L.) Bp. 



var. HUDSONiA (Gm.) Rids. 



Ha-wh OtvI; Day Ovrl, 



Surnia ulula, Kirkpateick, Ohio Farmer, viii, 1859, 67 ; Ohio Agric. Rep. for 1858, 383. — 

 Whbaton, Ohio Agric. Rep. for 1860, 361 ; Reprint, 1S61, 3 ; Food of Birds, etc., Ohio 

 Agric. Rep. for 1874, 570 ; Reprint, 1875, 10. 



Surnia ulula var. hudsonica, Langdon, Cat. Birds of Gin,, 1877, 12. 



Surnia ulula, var. hudsonia, Langdon, Revised List, Journ. Cin. Soc. Nat. Hist., i, 1879, 

 179; Reprint, 13. 



Strix ulula, LlNN^US, Syst. Nat., i, 1766, 133. 



Strix hudsonia, Gmblin, Syst. Nat. i, 1788, 295. 



Surnia funerea, Dumeril, Zool. Anal., 1806, 34. 



Surnia ulula, var. hudsonia, Ridgway, in Cones, Key, 1572, 205. 



Dark-brown above more or less thickly speckled with white ; below closely barred 

 with brown and whitish, the throat alone streaked ; quills and tail with numerous 

 white bars ; face ashy, margined with black. Length about 16 inches ; wing, 9 ; tail, 7, 

 graduated, the lateral feathers 2 inches shorter than the central. 



Habitat, Northern North America. Breeds from Maine northward. In winter oc- 

 casionally south to Pennsylvania and Illinois. Bermudas. Not yet observed west of 

 the Rocky Mountains. 



Rare winter visitor. The Hawk Owl is more northern in its distribu- 

 tion in winter than the preceeding species and is even more diurnal, 

 having the form and appearance of a Hawk with the soft plumage of an 

 Owl. 



