Peter Oe 
RELATIONSHIP .OF THE AMERICAN WHITE- 
FRONTED OWL. 
BY ROBERT RIDGWAY. 
I wisn to call the attention of ornithologists to a paper recently 
published in the London ‘‘ Ibis” (vol. ii, January, 1872), upon 
the relationship of the North American White-fronted Owl, known 
as “ Nyctale albifrons Shaw,” or “N. Kirtlandii Hoy.” The 
author of the paper in question, Mr. D. G. Elliot, refers that 
bird to the N. Tengmalmi Gmel., of Europe, with which species he 
also considers our N. Richardsoni Bonap., to be identical. That 
both these opinions are erroneous, I purpose showing in the follow- 
mg remarks : e 
The little owl above mentioned, is a bird identical in all the 
details of form and size with the N. Acadica Gmel., an exclusively _ 
North American form, which is scarcely more than half the size of 
the N, Tengmalmi, and cannot, by any means, be referred to the 
latter species. The birds which Mr. Elliot supposes to be identi- 
cal with “ N. albifrons” are merely the young of N. Tengmalmi, 
ma plumage analogous to that of the small North American 
Species, but resembling the latter no further. Mr. Elliot is by no 
means the first to notice this plumage, for it has been long known 
to European ornithologists, and its relations correctly understood 
(see Naumann “ Die Vögel Deutschlands,” i, p. 500, pl. 48, figs. 2 
and 3—where both the adult and young plumages are illustrated). 
Neither do I claim to be the first to refer the “ N. albifrons” to 
€ N. Acadica, as being its young stage, for Strickland in “ Orni- 
thological Synonymes” (i, 1855, p- 177) places the two together. 
ing aware of the differences between the adult and young 
blumages of the N. Tengmalmi, and seeing a direct analogy in the 
characters of the N. Acadica and “ N. albifrons” I suspected a 
“milar relation between these two small North American forms ; 
Stross. Course of my investigations of the North American 
trigide in the collection of the Smithsonian Institution I found 
er reasons for considering them old and young of one species. 
reasons I present as follows : — 
, Ist. All Specimens examined, of N. albifrons (including Hoy’s 
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