186 STRIGHILE.
wright also bears testimony, so far as his much shorter experience
goes, to the same general effect, adding that the
Hawk-Owl will strike down the Siberian Jay while on the
wing, and that he has more than once found it feeding on
the Willow-Grouse; but smaller birds and mice of various
kinds together with insects form its usual prey.
In the Fur-countries of North America Richardson says
the Hawk-Owl is resident and abundant throughout the year,
constantly attending the flocks of Ptarmigan on their spring
migrations to the northward. “ When the hunters,” he
adds, “ are shooting Grouse, this bird is occasionally attracted
by the report of a gun, and is often hold enough, 011
a bird being killed, to pounce down upon it, though it may
he unahle from its size to carry it off. I t is also known to
hover round the fires made by the natives at night.”
A specimen killed in Lapland, and presented to the Zoological
Society by Captain Everett, has the heak white; the
irides straw-yellow; facial disk dull white, bounded on the
sides hy a semilunar dark purplish-brown patch extending
from the ears downwards; head, back of the neck, and upper
part of the shoulders, mottled with dusky black and dull
white; back and wings dark umber-brown; lower part of
the back barred with dull white; tertials elongated, loose,
and downy, covering great part of the wing, and barred
alternately with dusky brown and white; tail above dusky
brown, with six or seven narrow bars and a broader terminal
band of dull white. Chin dusky; throat and a hand across
the upper part of the breast dull white ; breast, belly, and
under tail-coverts, dull white, with numerous narrow bars of
dusky brown; tail beneath barred alternately with greyish-
brown and dull white; feathers of the tarsi and toes greyisli-
wliite ; claws white at the base, tipped with bluish-black.
The whole length of the bird is about seventeen inches,
the female being somewhat larger than the male.
This species lias been much confounded hy nomenclators
with Tengmalm’s and the Short-eared Owl.
. .
SNOWY OWE.
ACCI P IT RES.
187
S TR IG I D Ai.
N y c t ea scandiaca (Linnaeus*).
THE SNOWY OWL.
Surnia nyctea f.
Nyctea, Stephens J .— Beak decurved from the base ; nostrils large, oval; cere
short; upper mandible smooth, lower mandible notched. Facial disk incomplete.
Orifice of the ears moderate, without operculum. Wings of moderate size ; the
third quill-feather the longest, second and fourth nearly equal. Tail rounded
and of moderate length. Legs and toes thickly covered with feathers. Head
large, round, not furnished with tufts of feathers.
T h is b e a u t i f u l s p e c ie s w a s f i r s t a s c e r t a in e d to o c c u r in
* Strix scandiaca, Linmeus, Syst. Nat. Ed. 12, i. p. 132 (1766).
f Strix nyctea, Linnaeus (loc. cit.)
I General Zoology, xiii. part ii. p. 62 (1826).
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