Order Columbe
PIGEONS AND DOVES.
FAMILY COLUMBIDE.
PIGEONS AND DOVES.
About one third of the three hundred known species of Pigeons and Doves are found in the New World, but of this number only twelve species occur in North America. The birds of this family differ widely in their choice of haunts. Some are strictly arboreal, others as strictly terrestrial. Some seek the forests and others prefer fields and clearings. Some nest in colonies, others in isolated pairs, but most species are found in flocks of greater or less size after the breeding season. When drinking, they do not raise the head as other birds do to swallow, but keep the bill immersed until the draught is finished. The young are born naked and are fed by regurgitation.
KEY TO THE SPECIES.
A. Tail widely tipped with white or grayish white. a. Tail pointed. a¹. Back or rump bluish slate-color. a2. Back olive grayish brown. b. Tail square B. Tail not tipped with white. a. Upper parts dark slate-color • 315. PASSENGER PIGEON. 316. MOURNING DOVE. 317. ZENAIDA DOVE. 314. WHITE-CROWNED PIGEON. b. Upper parts rufous with purplish reflections. 61. Line below the eye and belly white or whitish 322. QUAIL DOVE. 62. Line under the eye and belly buffy ochraceous. c. Upper parts grayish olive-brown. c1. Crown blue, a white line below the eye. c2. Crown pinkish or like the back 322.1. RUDDY QUAIL DOVE. 323. BLUE-HEADED QUAIL DOVE. 320. GROUND DOVE. 314. Columba leucocephala Linn. WHITE-CROWNED PIGEON. Ad. 8. Rich slate-color; crown white; back of the head purplish chestnut; back of the neck with greenish reflections, each feather with a black border. Ad. 2.-Similar, but paler; crown ashy, less purplish chestnut: back and sides of the neck brownish ash with metallic reflections and black margins. L., 13.50; W., 7.50; T., 5·10; B., 70.