Western Bird Guide: Birds of the Rockies and West to the Pacific

by Charles K. Reed

ZONE-TAILED HAWK.

340. Buteo abbreviatus. 19 inches.

This whole bird is black, with the exception of the tail, which has three wide bands of white and the ends of the tail feathers tipped with white. Like others of the Buteo family they feed almost entirely on the small rodents, which they find in abundance in the marsh and prairie, or in the low brush. Eggs, two to four, white, faintly spotted with light chestnut (2.15 × 1.75).