306 



BULLETIN 50, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



Medium-sized to rather small Odontophorinae (wing about 96-120 

 mm.) with tail less than three-fifths as long as wing, scapulars, tertials, 

 and rump spotted or blotched with blackish, and with crest indistinct 

 (obvious only when erected) or distinct (subgenus Etipsychortyx). 



Bill moderate in size, the culmen (chord, from extreme base) less 

 than half to half as, long as tarsus, its depth at base greater than distance 

 from anterior end of rtasal fossa to tip of maxilla, its width at rictus 

 equal to or greater than its depth at same point; culmen strongly con- 

 vex, more or less distinctly ridged, especially toward base. Outermost 

 primary usually longer than eighth (from outside) (shorter than 

 eighth in subgenus Eupsychortyx) , the third, fourth, and fifth (from 

 outside) longest, the second and sixth but little shorter. Tail between 

 one-half and three-fifths as long as wing, distinctly rounded, the rec- 



FlGURE 19.- 



-Colinus virginianus. 



trices (12) firm, broad, and rounded at tips. Tarsus a little less than 

 one-third as long as wing, shorter than middle toe with claw; planta 

 tarsi covered with small hexagonal scutella, those along posterior edge 

 of outer side larger (more or less) and forming a nearly to quite con- 

 tinuous row. 



Plumage and coloration. — Feathers of crown somewhat, to distinctly, 

 elongated either forming or not a distinct crest when not erected. 

 U^perparts mixed gray and cinnamon-rufous, vermiculated with darker, 

 the posterior scapulars, tertials, and rump (especially upper portion) 

 blotched or irregularly spotted with black, the upper tail coverts and 

 median rectrices with shaft streaks of the, same, the inner webs of tertials 

 broadly edged with buff ; underparts largely white variously marked with 

 black and cinnamon-rufous, sometimes plain cinnamon-rufous; head 

 striped with black and white, but sometimes mostly black, in males, buff 

 replacing white in females. 



