392 NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 
Genus LOXIA Linnavus. (Page 382, pl. CVL,, fig. 1.) 
Species. 
Common Cuaracters.—Adult males chiefly reddish, with dusky wings and tail, 
the former sometimes marked with white ; females plain olive, tinged with grayish 
or yellowish, sometimes more or less streaked with darker; young light olive- 
grayish, everywhere streaked with dusky. 
a. Wings without white markings. Adult males dull red (usually brighter on 
rump), the wings and tail uniform dusky. Adult females olivaceous instead 
of red, the olive varying in shade from a grayish to a yellowish cast, often 
strongly tinged, in places, with the latter color. Young: Pale dingy grayish 
or light olive, paler beneath, everywhere (except on wings and tail) streaked 
with dusky. 
6. Smaller: Length 5.50-6.25, wing 3.20-3.60 (average about 3.40), tail 1.85- 
2.40 (average about 2.15), culmen .50-.68 (average about .62), depth of 
bill .30-.40 (average about .35), tarsus .58-.68 (average about .63). West 
a rather flat structure, in coniferous trees, composed externally of spruce 
twigs, shreds of soft bark, etc., lined with horse-hair, fine rootlets, etc.; 
cavity about 2.50 across by 1.25 deep, external diameter about 4.00. 
figgs usually 4, .75 X .57, pale greenish, spotted with various shades of 
brown, mixed with purplish gray. Hab. North America in general, but 
chiefly far northward, and east of Great Plains; breeding, sporadically, 
south to Maryland and Virginia near coast, and to northern Georgia, 
Tennessee, and Kentucky in mountains. 
521. L. curvirostra minor (BreHm). American Crossbill. 
b. Larger: Length about 6.80-7.25, wing 3.85-4.10 (average nearly 4.00), tail 
2.50-2.60 (2.54), culmen .72-.82 (.78), depth of bill 45-50 (.49), tarsus 
.65-.72 (.70), lower mandible averaging heavier, compared with the 
upper, and colors brighter, than in LZ. minor. Hab. Southwestern United 
States, from western Kansas, Colorado, and Arizona, south through 
highlands of Mexico. 
521a. L. curvirostra stricklandi (Ripew.). Mexican Crossbill.! 
a, Wing with two broad white bands (on tips of middle and greater coverts), the 
two confluent at upper portion. Adult male: General color purplish red or 
dull rosy, occasionally tinged with yellow or orange; scapulars, wings, and 
tail deep black, the former varied with white, as described above; back 
clouded with blackish. Adult female: Olive-greenish or grayish above, paler, 
1A large majority of the specimens from western North America, north of Colorado and Arizona, and a 
“sprinkling” of those from eastern North America (especially in New England and the British Provinces), are 
intermediate between L. minor and L, etricklandi, as defined above. This connecting series, which in the north- 
western portion of the United States is sufficiently uniform in its characters to be worthy of recognition as a 
geographical race, has already been named by me L. curvirostra bendirei. (See Proc. Biol. Soc, Washington, 
ii, 1884, 101; author’s extras published April 28, 1884.) 
