98 



CAROLINA PARROT. 



luted with yellow below ; greater wing coverts and roots of the pri- 

 maries yellow, slightly tinged with green; interior webs of the pri- 

 maries deep dusky purple, almost black, exterior ones bluish green; 

 tail long, cuneiform, consisting of twelve feathers, the exterior one 

 only half the length, the others increasing to the middle ones, 

 which are streaked along the middle with light blue; shafts of all 

 the larger feathers, and of most part of the green plumage black; 

 knees and vent orange yellow; feet a pale whitish flesh color; claws 

 black; bill white, or slightly tinged with pale cream; iris of the 

 eye hazel ; round the eye is a small space without feathers cover- 

 ed with a whitish skin; nostrils placed in an elevated membrane 

 at the base of the bill, and covered with feathers; chin wholly bare 

 of feathers, but concealed by those descending on each side; from 

 each side of the palate hangs a lobe or skin of a blackish color; 

 tongue thick and fleshy; inside of the upper mandible near the point 

 grooved exactly like a file, that it may hold with more security. 



The female differs very little in her colors and markings from 

 the male. After examining numerous specimens, the following 

 appear to be the principal differences. The yellow on the neck 

 of the female does not descend quite so far; the interior vanes of 

 the primaries are brownish instead of black, and the orange red 

 on the bend and edges of the wing is considerably narrower; in 

 other respects the colors and markings are nearly the same. 



The young birds of the preceding year, of both sexes, are ge- 

 nerally destitute of the yellow on the head and neck, until about 

 the beginning or middle of March, having those parts wholly green, 

 except the front and cheeks, which are orange red in them as in 

 the full grown birds. Towards the middle of March the yellow 

 begins to appear, in detached feathers, interspersed among the 

 green, varying in different individuals. In some which I killed 

 about the last of that month, only a few green feathers remained 

 among the yellow; and these were fast assuming the yellow tint; 

 for the color changes without change of plumage. A number of 



