Brown, Olive or Grayish Brown, and Brown and Gray Sparrowy Birds 
Nighthawk 
( Cbordeiles virginianus ) Goatsucker family 
Called also: NIGHTJAR; BULL-BAT; MOSQUITO HAWK; 
WILL - O’ - THE - WISP ; PISK ; PIRAMIDIG ; LONG - 
WINGED GOATSUCKER 
Length — 9 to 10 inches. About the same length as the robin, but 
apparently much longer because of its very wide wing-spread. 
Male and Female — Mottled blackish brown and rufous above, with 
a multitude of cream-yellow spots and dashes. Lighter 
below, with waving bars of brown on breast and under- 
neath. White mark on throat, like an imperfect horseshoe; 
also a band of white across tail of male bird. These latter 
markings are wanting in female. Heavy wings, which are 
partly mottled, are brown on shoulders and tips, and longer 
than tail. They have large white spots, conspicuous in 
flight, one of their distinguishing marks from the whippoor- 
will. Head large and depressed, with large eyes and ear- 
openings. Very small bill. 
Range — From Mexico to arctic islands. 
Migrations — May. October. Common summer resident. 
The nighthawk’s misleading name could not well imply 
more that the bird is not : it is not nocturnal in its habits, neither 
is it a hawk, for if it were, no account of it would be given in 
this book, which distinctly excludes birds of prey. Stories of its 
chicken-stealing prove to be ignorant rather than malicious slan- 
ders. Any one disliking the name, however, surely cannot com- 
plain of a limited choice of other names by which, in different 
sections of the country, it is quite as commonly known. 
Too often it is mistaken for the whippoorwill. The night- 
hawk does not have the weird and woful cry of that more dismal 
bird, but gives instead a harsh, whistling note while on the wing, 
followed by a vibrating, booming, whirring sound that Nuttall 
likens to “the rapid turning of a spinning wheel, or a strong 
blowing into the bung-hole of an empty hogshead.” This pecu- 
liar sound is responsible for the name nightjar, frequently given 
to this curious bird. It is said to be made as the bird drops sud- 
denly through the air, creating a sort of stringed instrument of its 
outstretched wings and tail. When these wings are spread, their 
large white spots running through the feathers to the under side 
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