+Athene cunicularia+, _Darwin, Zool. Beagle_, iii. p. 31. +Noctua cunicularia+, _Burm. La-Plata Reise_, ii. p. 440; _Durnford, Ibis_, 1877, p. 38, et 1878, p. 397 (Patagonia). +Pholeoptynx cunicularia+, _Scl. et Salv. Nomencl._ p. 117; _Hudson, P. Z. S._ 1874, p. 308 (Buenos Ayres); _Durnford, Ibis_, 1877, p. 186 (Buenos Ayres); _Gibson, Ibis_, 1879, p. 423 (Buenos Ayres); _White, P. Z. S._ 1882, p. 622 (Catamarca, Misiones). +Speotyto cunicularia+, _Sharpe, Cat. B._ ii. p. 142; _Barrows, Auk_, 1884, p. 30 (Entrerios); _Withington, Ibis_, 1888, p. 469 (Lomas de Zamora). _Description._--Above dark sandy brown, with large oval spots of white and smaller spots and freckles of pale brown; wings and tail dark brown, with broad whitish cross bars; facial disk greyish brown, surrounded by white: beneath white, sides of breast marked with broad bars of brown, which become fainter on the belly; lower belly, thighs, and crissum pure white; tarsi feathered; toes slightly bristled: whole length 10·0 inches, wing 7·5, tail 3·5. _Female_ similar, but rather larger. _Hab._ North and South America. The Burrowing-Owl is abundant everywhere on the pampas of Buenos Ayres and avoids woods, but not districts abounding in scattered trees and bushes. It sees much better than most Owls by day, and never affects concealment nor appears confused by diurnal sounds and the glare of noon. It stares fixedly--"with insolence," Azara says--at a passer-by, following him with the eyes, the round head turning about as on a pivot. If closely approached it drops its body or bobs in a curious fashion, emitting a brief scream, followed by three abrupt ejaculations; and if made to fly goes only fifteen or twenty yards away, and alights again with face towards the intruder; and no sooner does it alight than it repeats the odd gesture and scream, standing stiff and erect, and appearing beyond measure astonished at the intrusion. By day it flies near the surface with wings continuously flapping, and invariably before alighting glides upwards for some distance and comes down very abruptly. It frequently runs rapidly on the ground, and is incapable of sustaining flight long. Gaucho boys pursue these birds for sport on horseback, taking them after a chase of fifteen or twenty minutes. They live in pairs all the year, and sit by day at the mouth of their burrow or on the Vizcacha's mound, the two birds so close together as to be almost touching; when alarmed they both fly away, but sometimes the male only, the female diving into the burrow. On the pampas it may be more from necessity than choice that they always sit on the ground, as they are usually seen perched on the summits of bushes where such abound, as in Patagonia.