ANATOMY OF BIRDS
GEOGRAPHICAL DISTRIBUTION
MIGRATIONS OF BIRDS
CLASSIFICATION OF BIRDS
LIZARD-TAILED BIRD
AMERICAN TOOTHED-BIRDS
THE OSTRICHES
THE RHEAS
EMEUS AND CASSOWARIES
THE TINAMOUS
THE KIWIS
THE PENGUINS
LOONS AND GREBES
ALBATROSSES & PETRELS
STORK-LIKE BIRDS
GOOSE-LIKE BIRDS
FALCON-LIKE BIRDS
FOWL-LIKE BIRDS
CRANE-LIKE BIRDS
PLOVER-LIKE BIRDS
CUCKOO-LIKE BIRDS
THE ROLLER-LIKE BIRDS
SPARROW-LIKE BIRDS
Birds and Birding's Guide to:
Watching THE ROLLER-LIKE BIRDS
THE ROLLERS AND THEIR ALLIES
THE OWLS
Owls Family
(Subfamily Bubonina).-—All the remaining Owls, whatever their size, plumage, habits, or geographical distribution, are included within the limits of the second subfamily, and the difficulty of finding a satisfactory collective name for such a miscellaneous assemblage is not, perhaps, to be wondered at; without great violence to the facts, however, they may receive the general designation given above.
The characters which serve to separate them are, if it is permissible to use the expression, mainly the reverse of those which marked the first subfamily, viz., the breast-bone is provided with notches on its lower border; the inner toe is decidedly shorter than the middle one, the claw of which is- without serrations on its inner edge, while the first quill is shorter than the third, and from one to six of the quills have their inner webs sinuated.
The attempt has been made to divide this subfamily up into a number of groups, which have been called subfamilies, the whole group being dignified by family rank, but the venture has not been very successful. However, it may be well enough to follow the sequence of these so-called subfamilies, bearing in mind that they do not rest on very ample or secure foundations.
The first of these (Asionina) includes the Long-eared and Short-eared Owls, which to the number of a dozen or more forms are comprised in the genus Asio. They are birds of medium size with a relatively small head and small eyes, well-developed or rudimentary ear-tufts, and a very large ear-conch which is unsym-metrical on the opposite sides of the head; the bill is rather weak and compressed, with the cere much arched, while the tail is about half the length of the wing and rounded, and only the first, or first and second, outer primary has the inner web emarginated.
previous bird species next bird species
Footer
Footer