WAXWINGS AND PHAINOPEPLAS 
387 
Distribution. — Northern hemisphere; in America breeding from the 
limit of trees south to the central United States ; wintering from the 
southern border of the United States south to the West Indies, Central, 
and northern South America. 
Nest. — In horizontal holes or burrows, excavated in sand banks, cuts, 
and banks of streams. Eggs : 3 to 6, white. 
Food. — Insects. 
The colonies of chattering little hank swallows with dull colored 
backs and dark chest bands seem to require little more than a sand 
bank and a telegraph wire for complete happiness, and given these, 
blow the wind east or blow the wind west, they gossip merrily on. 
GENUS STELGIDOPTERYX. 
617. Stelgidopteryx serripennis {Aud.). Rough-winged Swal¬ 
low. 
Bill small; tail short and slightly emarginate ; tarsus slightly feath¬ 
ered above ; lateral claws curved , 1 „ - . . 
and not reaching x sV\^ *' " 
beyond the base of * 
the middle claw ; Fi 8- 4 78. 
Fig. 479. 
outer web of outer primaries saw-toothed in male, roughened 
in female. Adults: upper parts dull grayish brown, darker 
on wings and tail, tertials usually margined with grayish; 
under parts soiled gray, belly and under tail coverts white. 
Young : like adults, but plumage more or less washed with brown; wings 
with broad cinnamon tips and margins. Length: 5.00-5.75, wing 4.00- 
4.70, tail 2.05-2.35. 
Distribution. — Breeds in Sonoran and Transition zones of British Colum¬ 
bia, Ontario, the United States, and Mexico ; migrates to Guatemala. 
Nest. — In holes, usually in banks, but often in abutments of bridges, 
Eggs: 3 to 0, white. 
Food. — Flies and other insects. 
The dingy rough wings are less sociable than the bank swallows 
during the nesting season, but afterwards assemble in large flocks 
and are in less of a hurry to start for the south. 
In Nevada, during a shower, Mr. Oberholser once found a flock 
congregated about a small cliff in a cave. 
FAMILY AMPELIDiE: WAXWINGS AND FHAINO- 
PEFLAS. 
KEY TO GENERA. 
1. Wings pointed. Ampelis, p. 387. 
1'. Wings rounded. Phainopepla, p. 390. 
GENUS AMPELIS. 
General Characters. — Head crested; bill short, broad, flat, rather 
obtuse, plainly notched near tip of each mandible ; wings long and pointed, 
much longer than tail; primaries apparently only nine, the first being 
