. Key to North American birds. Containing a concise account of every species of living and fossil bird at present known from the continent north of the Mexican and United States boundary, inclusive of Greenland and lower California, with which are incorporated General ornithology: an outline of the structure and classification of birds; and Field ornithology, a manual of collecting, preparing, and preserving birds. Birds; Birds; 1887. 556 SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS. — RAPTOMES—ACCIPITRES. 32. Family PANDIONID^ ; Fish Hawks ; Ospreys. 88. 530. Seo page 498. Plu- mage peculiar, close and firm, imbricat
. Key to North American birds. Containing a concise account of every species of living and fossil bird at present known from the continent north of the Mexican and United States boundary, inclusive of Greenland and lower California, with which are incorporated General ornithology: an outline of the structure and classification of birds; and Field ornithology, a manual of collecting, preparing, and preserving birds. Birds; Birds; 1887. 556 SYSTEMATIC SYNOPSIS. — RAPTOMES—ACCIPITRES. 32. Family PANDIONID^ ; Fish Hawks ; Ospreys. 88. 530. Seo page 498. Plu- mage peculiar, close and firm, imbricated, oily, lacking after- shafts ; head densely feathered up to the eyes; occipital feath- ers lengthened; legs chisely feathered, with- out any sign of a fiag; quills of the wings and tail acuminate, stiff and hard, and the primary coverts of similar char- acter. Feet immense- ly large and strong, roughly gran ular-retic- nlate; tarsi little feath- ered above in front; toes all free to the base, the outer versa- tile. Claws very large, all of equal lengths, subcyliudric or taper- ing terete, not being scooped out under- neatl], but all compressed, and the middle one shar))ly grooved on the inner face. Bill tooth- less, contiacted at the cere, elsewhere inflated, with very large hook; gonys convex, ascending; nostrils oval, oblique, without tubercle, and in the edge of the cere. The peculiarities of the plumage and of tlic feet ar(^ in evident adaptation to the semi-aquatic piscivorous habits of these "fishing hawks," which require a water-proof covering, and great talons to grasp their slippery quarry. The structural characters are rather those of the buteonine than the falconine birds of prey, in tlie eoracoid un-angement, etc. The supraorbital shield is rudimentary, leaving the eye flush with the side f)f the head. The family consists of a single genus, and probably but one cosmopolitan species, the well-lcmiwu Osprey, Paiidion haliaetiis. PANDl'ON. (Gr. navdlav
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1880, booksubjectbirds, bookyear1887
