_Chicken Hawk._
_Buteo borealis._
_Falco borealis_, +Linn.+—Aud. pl. 51.
_Falco Jamaicensis_, +Gmel.+
_Buteo borealis_, +Bechst.+
[2] Length 20 inches, expanse 44¹⁄₂, tail 7¹⁄₂, flexure 13¹⁄₂,
rictus 1⁹⁄₁₀, tarsus 3³⁄₄, middle toe 1¹⁄₂, claw 1.
This Buzzard, which we learn from Wilson is spread over the United
States, is the most common raptorial bird in Jamaica. Permanent, not
migratory, we see it all the year round, sailing deliberately in wide
circles over the pastures and ruinates, now near the ground, but
presently soaring into the upper air, each circle higher and higher
till the bird is lost in the glare of a tropical sky. It is common to
see two individuals of this species in company, sailing each in its own
circle, but intersecting the other; and as they thus fly, they utter
from time to time a sudden energetic cry, “_pinyee_.”
The frequency of this bird’s depredations on the poultry of the
homestead, has given it a provincial appellation. In the stomach of
one, examined by Wilson, he found, however, the remains of frogs and
lizards. Its courage is not proportioned to its size or arms. Not long
ago, near Bluefields, two of these Hawks swooped together upon a white
barn-door cock, who defended himself so vigorously and so successfully
as to keep them both at bay for some time, until, help coming, both the
marauders were shot.
Some observations of Mr. Hill’s, on the flight of the birds of prey,
elicited by a few remarks in a letter from a friend, appeared to me so
interesting, that he kindly placed both in my hands, for the advantage
of the present work; and I here present them to my readers.
_Samuel R. Ricketts, Esq., to Richard Hill, Esq._
“With regard to Hawks, I have had many opportunities of observing
their habits here, as I have a large common, and a flock of
turkeys. They perform successive circular movements in the air,
and their pounce is done by closing the wings upwards. They appear
to be falling, when doing so. A chicken was taken here some days
ago from the roof of the house, having fallen from the talons of a
Hawk I was in pursuit of. The South American Hawks fly higher, and
in larger circles, than those of Europe:—why, I cannot tell, but
such is the fact. I speak from personal observation. Our Hawk has a
peculiar note in very dry weather, and is then said by the negroes
to be “calling the rain.”
_Richard Hill, Esq., in Reply._
“Your observation about the widened circuit which the Hawks of this
country, and those of South America generally, take when surveying
their prey, has led me to trouble you with the following remarks on
the flight of raptorial birds.
“Raptorial birds that take their quarry on the ground, as we
very well know, before they seize their prey, attentively survey
it; keeping it in view by sailing round and round it. In these
circumgyratory evolutions they leisurely gaze down on their
intended victim, and then descend circle by circle, to pounce on it
with a swoop.
“The attention of birds in ordinary or direct flight is immediately
fixed on the objects before them. The swiftness with which they
shoot through the air makes every visual impression indistinct
and evanescent on either side of them. If they take wing for a
distance, they rise at once high, that they may command a view
of the place which they intend to visit; and if they proceed to
an object that is near, they elevate themselves to such a height
only as is necessary to give them a clear and direct course to
where they are speeding. The circular flight of raptorial birds,
is therefore the result of their directing their vision to the
centre of the gyrations they describe in examining their prey, or
descending upon their victims.
“The eye of all birds is large and prominent. The prominence widens
the field of vision. The width of the circle which the several
kinds of raptorial birds variously describe, I think, as a rule,
will be found to be determined by the size of the head and position
of the eyes, or increased with the rotundity of the head of the
bird. The direct vision being altered with the increase of space
between the eyes, Hawks of the Buzzard kind, which have large and
round heads, may be expected to wheel in wide circles; the expanded
space being required, that they may keep the vision of their
wide-apart eyes direct upon the objects beneath them.
“Owls fly differently. They search for their prey, as if they were
pursuing it with the vigilance of the hound. They skim along the
surface of the earth, glide among trees, explore avenues, sweep
round, rise and fall, wheel short, and dart down, but never sail in
circles. Their wide staring eyes are placed in what may be called
their face, being right forward in front, and have scarcely any
field of vision laterally. They therefore hunt with a forward and
downward gaze, like dogs over a field. The globe of the eye of
these nocturnal _raptores_, being immoveably fixed in the socket
by a strong elastic cartilaginous case, in the form of a truncated
cone, they have to turn their heads to view objects out of the path
of flight, and their neck is so adapted for this exertion, that
they can with ease turn round the head in almost a complete circle,
without moving the body.”
I have never met with the nest of this Hawk; nor has Wilson given us
any information concerning it; but a young friend, very conversant
with out-of-door natural history, informs me that he lately knew of
one, a large mass near the top of an immense cotton-tree into which he
observed the old birds frequently go. It was at Content, in the parish
of St. Elizabeth. The gigantic dimensions assumed by the _Ceiba_, which
strike a stranger with astonishment, combined with the smoothness of
the trunk, rendered its summit perfectly inaccessible, and prevented
particular examination. At length he witnessed the emergence of two
young ones, and their first essay at flight. He assures me that he
distinctly saw the parent bird, after the first young one had flown a
little way, and was beginning to flutter downward,—he saw the mother,
for the mother surely it was,—fly beneath it, and present her back and
wings for its support. He cannot say that the young actually rested
on, or even touched the parent;—perhaps its confidence returned on
seeing support so near, so that it managed to reach a dry tree; when
the other little one, invited by the parent, tried its infant wings in
like manner. This touching manifestation of parental solicitude is used
by the Holy Spirit in the Song of Moses, to illustrate the tenderness
of love with which Jehovah led his people Israel about, and cared for
them in the wilderness. “As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth
over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them
on her wings; so the Lord alone did lead him, and there was no strange
God with him.”—(Deut. xxxii. 12.—See also Exod. xix. 4.)