224 
GOATSUCKERS 
their whip-pur'r'r-will. Sometimes the notes are repeated faster and 
faster till they all run together. 
In the Santa Catalina Mountains, Arizona, Mr. Bailey found one 
sitting in the shade of a rock in the daytime. At his approach, 
with a quick spring it would dart out of sight around the next rock 
and drop into the darkest shade. Its flight was perfectly noiseless 
and very swift. 
GENUS PHAL^ENOPTILUS. 
General Characters. — Bill short with wide gape, nostrils tubular, cylin¬ 
drical, opening forward and outward ; rictal bristles conspicuous ; feet 
small, hind toe short, middle toe long, its claw pectinated, front toes 
webbed (see Fig. 290) ; tarsus as long as middle toe without claw, naked 
except for joint; tail square, much shorter than wings. 
Fig. 289. 
KEY TO SPECIES. 
1. Upper parts blackish or dark brown .... californicus, p. 225. 
1'. Upper parts light brown or grayish. 
2. Smaller and paler. Kansas to Texas and Arizona . nitidus, p. 225. 
2'. Larger and not so pale. Nebraska to Cascades . nuttallii, p. 224. 
418. Phalsenoptilus nuttallii (. Aud .). Poor-will. 
Adult male. — Plumage of upper parts moth-like, soft, and velvety, 
finely mottled grayish brown with sharply contrasting velvety black bars 
and sagittate markings; tail with all hut middle feathers tipped with 
white ; sides of head, and chin black , white throat patch bordered by black 
below; rest of under parts barred except for plain huffy under tail cov¬ 
erts. Adult female: similar, hut with white tips to tail feathers nar¬ 
rower. Young: upper parts more silvery gray mixed with rusty; black 
markings smaller and less distinct; white of throat and tail restricted 
and tinged with huffy. Wing : 5.78, tail 3.67. 
Distribution. — Breeds in Upper Sonoran and Transition zone of British 
Columbia and the western United States, from the Cascades and Sierra 
Nevada east to central Nebraska ; winters from deserts along the southern 
border south to Guatemala. 
Eggs. — Usually laid on the bare ground; 2, white, unspotted or lightly 
marked. 
Food. — Night-flying moths, beetles, locusts, and other insects. 
In southern California in the dim evening light I have often seen 
poor-wills hunting insects along the roads and had them come close 
to me in a ranch dooryard when they would make short sallies from 
the ground, fluttering around with soft, noiseless flight, uttering a 
low chuck , chuck. In the daytime their eyes are of little use. A 
pair of the birds that Mr. Bailey once came upon at Emigrant Gap 
3howed this sun blindness very strikingly. They had been sitting 
