National Museum, 13; Philadelphia Academy, 3; Cab. G. N. Lawrence, 2;
Coll. R. Ridgway, 1. Total, 19.
_Measurements._
+----+-----------+-----------+---------+---------+-----------+----------+
|Sex.| Wing. | Tail. | Culmen. | Tarsus. |Middle Toe.|Specimens.|
+----+-----------+-----------+---------+---------+-----------+----------+
| ♂ |12.35–13.75| 9.80–10.20| .90–.95|3.15–3.20| 1.65–1.70| 8 |
+----+-----------+-----------+---------+---------+-----------+----------+
| ♀ |14.25–14.50|10.80–11.00|1.08–1.10|3.40–3.75| 1.90–2.00| 6 |
+----+-----------+-----------+---------+---------+-----------+----------+
HABITS. This Hawk has a very limited range within the United States,
and Mr. Audubon, who was the first to meet with it there, obtained only
a single specimen from Louisiana. Supposing it to be an undescribed
species, he named it in honor of his friend, Mr. Edward Harris.
[Illustration: _Parabuteo harrisi._]
This species is occasionally found in the lower portions of the States
of Mississippi and Louisiana, but becomes much more abundant in the
southwestern sections of the latter State, and in Texas is common,
especially about the mouth of the Rio Grande. In one variety or the
other it is frequently met with throughout Mexico, and Central America,
and is also said to be an occasional visitant of Cuba and Jamaica.
Mr. Dresser found this Hawk common throughout Texas to the Colorado
River, beyond which he noticed but few. It was the only Hawk he noticed
at Matamoras in the summer. He describes it as a heavy, sluggish bird,
seldom seen on the wing, and subsisting, so far as he could see,
entirely on carrion. All along the road from Brownsville to San Antonio,
he noticed it either perched on some tree by the roadside, or busy, in
company with Vultures and Caracaras, regaling on some offensive carrion.
He found it breeding in the neighborhood of San Antonio, Medina, and
Altascosa Rivers, having eggs in the month of May. A nest found on the
4th of May, near the Medina River, was built of sticks, very slightly
lined, and was placed in a low hackberry-tree. The eggs were four
in number, and described as white, with a faint bluish tinge, very
sparingly spotted and blotched with red.
Other writers also agree in representing this Hawk as heavy and
sluggish in habit, and as frequenting streams of water, and its food as
consisting chiefly of the reptiles and smaller animals which frequent
the banks of rivers and creeks. It builds its nests on low trees,
in the immediate vicinity of its hunting-ground, and often over the
water, constructing them of coarse flags and water-plants. The nests
are usually not very large for the birds, are flattened or with very
slight depressions, and the materials are very loosely put together.
The eggs are from three to five in number, usually white and unspotted,
occasionally with more or less of a yellowish or tawny tinge. In some
instances they are faintly marked with light dashes or stains of a
yellowish-brown, and, more rarely, are also marked with small blotches
of sepia-brown, and with smaller dottings of purplish-drab. Their
average measurement is, length 2.13, breadth 1.69 inches.
Our knowledge of the eggs of these Hawks is derived from the collection
of the late Dr. Berlandier, of Matamoras, in the Province of Tamaulipas,
Mexico. In the cabinet of that gentleman were several varieties, now in
the possession of the Smithsonian Institution, and presented to it by
Lieutenant Couch.
[Illustration: _Onychotes gruberi, Type,_ (=41703.= _California._)]
[Illustration: =41703= ¼ ½
_Onychotes gruberi._]