Education Department Bulletin 



Published fortnightly by the University of the State of New York 



Entered as "second-class matter June 24, 1908, at the Post Office at Albany, X. Y., under 



the act of July 16, 1894 



No. 447 ALBANY, N. Y. May 15, 1909 



New York State Museum 



John M. Clarke, Director 

 Museum bulletin 130 



OSTEOLOGY OF BIRDS 



R. W. SHUFELDT M.D. 



OSTEOLOGY OF THE ACCIPITRES 

 PREFACE 



In years gone by I find I have published a number of illustrated 

 notes, papers and one or two more or less extensive memoirs on 

 the raptorial birds, the Old World vultures and the American 

 Cathartidae. Nearly all of these were of an osteological character, 

 and will be utilized or more or less incorporated into the present 

 work. In doing this a few of my former figures will be reproduced, 

 but beyond this all the text cuts illustrating the present treatise are 

 entirely new, and have not heretofore been published anywhere, and 

 this is the case with all of the figures upon the plates. 



My earliest osteological paper upon this group of birds was pub- 

 lished in October 1881, and was entitled On the Ossicle of the Anti- 

 brachinm as Found in Some of the North American Falconidae 

 [Nutt. Qrnith. Club Bui. p. 197-203]. In January 1886 I gave a 

 brief paper On the Free Post-pubis in Certain of the Falconidae 

 [The Auk, v. 3, no. 1, p. 133-34]. Both articles were illustrated. 

 Three years thereafter, or in April 1889, I published an illustrated 

 account of the Osteology of Circus hudsonius [Jour. Comp. Med. 

 & Surg. v. 10, no. 2, art. 10, p. 126-59], and this paper with the 

 figures to it, thoroughly revised, is incorporated into the present 

 bulletin. In October 1892 I described some extinct birds of the 



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