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THE BLUE-HEADED PIGEON
COLUMBA CYANOCEPHALA, LiNN.
PLATE CLXXII. Male and Female.
A FEW of these birds migrate each spring from the Island of Cuba to the Keys of Florida, but are rarely seen, an account of the deep tangled woods in which they live. Early in May 1832, while on a shoot- ing excursion with the commander of the United States Revenue Cutter, the Marion, I saw a pair of them on the western side of Key West. They were near the water, picking gravel, but on our approaching them they ran back into the thickets, which were only a few yards distant. Se- veral fishermen and wreckers informed us that they were more abundant on the " Mule Keys ;" but although a large party and myself searched these islands for a whole day, not one did we discover there. I saw a pair which I was told had been caught when young on the latter Keys, but I could not obtain any other information respecting them, than that they were fed on cracked com and rice, which answered the purpose well.
I have represented three of these Pigeons on the ground, with some of the creeping plants which grew in the place where I saw the pair mentioned above.
Columba CYANOCEPHALA, Lhiii. Sjst. Nat. vol. i. p. 282 Lalh. Intl. Ornitli. vol. ii. p. 698.
Blue-headed Turtle, Lath. Synops. vol. iv. p. 651.
Adult Male. Plate CLXXII.
Bill straight, and short, rather slender, compressed ; upper mandible with a tumid fleshy covering at the base, a convex declinate obtuse tip, of which the margins are acute and overlapping ; lower mandible with the angle near the extremity, which is compressed and rounded. Nostrils medial, oblique, linear. Head small and compressed ; the general form robust, resembling that of many partridges. Legs short and of mode- rate length ; tarsus covered anteriorly and laterally with quincuncial sub- hexagonal scales, rounded and scaly behind ; toes scutellate, free, margined ; claws rather small, arched, compressed, flat beneath, obtuse.
