Covert feather

“ The outer web of outer feather is only narrowly edged with white, instead of being entirely so to the shaft (except in one specimen) , and the terminal white tip, confined to the inner web, is only from .50 to .75 of an inch long, instead of 1.25 to 1.75, or about the amount on the second feather of northern specimens, as shown in the accompanying figures. There is apparently a greater tendency to dusky streaks and specks in the rufous of the side of the breast or in the adjacent white. Resident specimens from Georgia are intermediate in size and color between the northern and Florida races. ”

“ Now is your time to whip the feathers with a supple switch, or a light filler of stiff wire, to make each bedraggled feather fluff up at the base of its shaft, and spread its web for all it is worth. This treatment is also vitally necessary to knock the plaster out of the plumage. Work the feathers with your long forceps, lifting them up a bunch at a time and letting them fall back into place. ”

“ The growth of the feathers is, however, certainly affected by the general health of the bird, mal-nutrition causing the appearance of peculiar transverse V-shaped grooves, at more or less regular intervals, along the whole length of the feather. ”

“ The middle of the under parts are very pale whitish drab, gradually becoming white on abdomen and under tail-coverts. On the middle of the breast there is a black feather, with several others showing the dark pigment being thrown into them, while at the roots of most of the feathers on the sternum a dark colouring matter is making its appearance. ”

“ Its general colour is a black brown, with narrow bars of pale ocraceous; plumage near the base of the beak above tinged with ferruginous; each feather on the head, with a single band and slight tip, those of the neck, back, tail coverts, and breast, two bands and tip, the tips on the upper part of the back and on the tail coverts are broad and spotted with black, with the inferior band often obsolete; the throat and inferior portion of the upper sides of the neck are covered with whitish feathers, on each of which is a black band or spot ”

“ While the men were driving the birds into the kraal, Mr. Shaffner explained that there was a difference of opinion among farmers as to whether the feathers should be plucked or cut. He said that when the feather is plucked or pulled out at the roots it is apt to make a bad sore, and at any rate cause a great deal of pain; while the feather that grows in its place is apt to be twisted or of poor quality, and occasionally the birds die, as a result of the operation. ”

“ The tail of the male is imperfect, the bird being in moult, but the longest existing feather is one of the uropygials and is an old feather, and the short outermost feathers are nearly half inch shorter than the corresponding ones in the female. ”

“ Young female. Colour.—Head, back of neck, back, wing coverts and tertiaries barred and mottled, both with pale umber brown (of the same tint as in the male bird) and with pale fulvous orange. On head and back of neck, each feather is of the latter colour, with a mere patch of the brown on its tip; but in the longer feathers, as in the scapulars, upper tail coverts, inner web and part of outer of the tertiaries, each is distinctly barred with the dark brown. Tail as in the old male. Primaries black as in male, with the inner webs nearly white, and marked with short transverse bars. ”

“ For the lighter one I recommend the hen pheasant's or brown owl's wing feather, dubbed with hare's ear and yellow silk; for the dark, the tail feather of a partridge, a brown red hackle underneath the wings, and dark orange silk, or a woodcock's feather for wings, and a dark red hackle with dark orange silk,—kills exceedingly well. When the water is low and fine, I consider your chance of killing fish far greater with two, than three of the large spring flies. ”

“ Above brownish-black, the feathers sharply edged with brownish-yellow. Outer tail-feathers white, except the basal portion of inner web, and a shaft streak at end; next feather with a white streak in end, rest black. Legs black; bill yellow, tipped with black. In winter plumage the black and other markings overlaid by rusty and fulvous; beneath by whitish. Female with the black feathers of head edged with yellowish-rusty; the throat white, bordered on the sides and behind by blackish; feathers edged with grayish-white, the rufous of nape obscure, and streaked with blackish. ”

“ For their stationary habits expose their feathers to much greater risks than are run by those of insects that are more constantly in flight, and on this account they are provided with this protecting shield. The feather of an insect has neither barbs nor shaft. For, though it is called a feather, it is no feather at all, but merely a skin-like membrane that, owing to its dryness, necessarily becomes detached from the surface of the body, as the fleshy substance grows cold. ”

“ Growth and molting of feathers. The first covering of a young bird is down. The young of birds which nest on the ground have the down covering when hatched; others acquire it in a few days. In small land birds which feather quickly, as Leghorn and Hamburg chicks, the largest wing feathers may have started to grow before the chick leaves the egg. In most kinds of poultry, however, the young show no signs of feathers for some days. The down is gradually replaced by small feathers, and these by larger feathers as the bird grows. ”

“ Short and blunt as his tail looks when he flies, each feather ends in a hard sharp point which sticks out beyond the soft part. They feed on insects which they catch as they dash through the air, and can also break off dry twigs for nest-building without stopping—sometimes seizing the little sticks in their bills and sometimes in their claws, which are much stronger than those of Swallows."
"How do they make the sticks stay in the chimney? What do they set them on, and how do they perch while they are building?" asked Nat, all in one breath. ”

“ I call them fair, because they are the colour of fair hair; they have a sort of peak like a widow's, upon their breasts, which is of a dun colour. No one feather is straggling from the other all over their bodies, they being very careful to adjust themselves, and make them all even with their beaks. The feathers on their thighs are round like shells at the end, and being there very thick, have an agreeable effect. They have two risings on their craws, and the feathers are whiter there than the rest, which livelily represents the fine neck of a beautiful woman. ”

“ The material of a feather consists of cells that push each other out to their destination. They change their forms as they travel along, and their colors and degrees of hardness change with their going. ”

“ FEATHER (O. Eng. fether, Ger. Feder, from an Indo-European root seen also in Gr. πτερόν, and πέτεσθαι, to fly) , a horny outgrowth of the skin of birds homologous with the scale of the reptile. The body-covering of birds is, without exception, comprised of feathers, and by this character alone birds may be distinguished from all other animals.
The most perfect form of feather is made up of a long, tapering rod, fringed on either side, for the greater part of its length, by a secondary series of slender and tapering rods forming a more or less acute angle with the central axis. ”

“ The blood dries up when the feather has unfolded to its full size, leaving it light and dry, with a horny part at the root that sticks in the hole where it grew, and a spray-like part that makes up most of the feather. ”

“ In some feathers, as the hackle, and in the wing bar feathers of the male of some breeds, there is a portion of the upper outer edge of the feather not provided with barbules, which fact gives the feather its characteristic appearance. The down feathers are loose and fluffy. ”

“ She is always very busy, and especially so at the beginning of the winter, for then she has to unpack her great feather bed, and after that is done she spends all of her time shaking it. Indeed she shakes it so much that she wears many holes in it, through which the feathers fly in all directions. ”

“ The tail is very short, and the middle feather the longest: the others on each side shorten gradually, and are of the colour of the rest of the bird, only somewhat darker: the two shortest or outermost feathers arc perfectly white, which the bird has a faculty of flirting out on either side as quick as a flash of lightning, especially when he hears or sees any thing that disturbs him, uttering at the same instant an extreme harsh and loud shriek. ”

“ In the adult male in spring plumage the general color of the upper parts is ochraceous brown, each feather having a transverse terminal crescent-shaped black band; most of the feathers have pale shafts and a more or less distinct ochraceous transverse subterminal band, very conspicuous on the head and neck; lores grayish white; no trace of eye-stripe; wing-coverts and innermost secondaries shading from dark olive-brown on the inside webs to ochraceous brown on the outside webs, but, with the exception of the primary-coverts, wanting the black terminal bands ”

“ Powder-down feathers are degenerate down-feathers which appear to secrete a dry, waxy kind of powder. This powder rapidly disintegrates and becomes distributed over the plumage, adding thereto a quite peculiar bloom. In birds of the heron tribe powder-down feathers have reached a high degree of development, forming large patches in the breast and thighs, while in some hawks, and in the parrots, these mysterious feathers are scattered singly over the greater part of the body.
The nature of the covering of nestling birds is of a more complex character than has hitherto been suspected. ”

“ It would seem that while the feather germ may be artificially stimulated to produce three successive generations of feathers within a year, it may, on the other hand, be induced artificially to maintain a continuous activity extending over long periods. That is to say, the normal quiescent period, and periodic moult, may be suspended, so that the feather maintains a steady and continuous growth till it attains a length of several feet. ”

“ Feather brushes and dusters are made from the wing-feathers of the domestic fowl and other birds; those of a superior quality, under the name of vulture dusters, being really made of American ostrich feathers. A minor application of feathers is found in the dressing of artificial fly-hooks for fishing. As steel pens came into general use it became an object of considerable importance to find applications for the supplanted goose-quills, and a large field of employment for them was found in the preparation of toothpicks. ”

“ Back, scapulars, and lesser and middle wing-coverts fine rufous, each feather with a broad median, longitudinal spot of brownish plumbeous-black, these on the back rather exceeding the rufous; longer wing-coverts and secondaries ashy-umber, with very obsolete transverse bands of darker; primary coverts more ashy, and more distinctly banded; primaries fine chalky cinereous, this lightest on outer four; shafts pure white. Rump nearly uniform brownish-black,—posterior feathers rufous with medial black blotches; upper tail-coverts snowy white on outer webs, inner webs more rufous ”

“ Let us break ourselves altogether of the feather wearing habit. We shall be more conspicuously consistent as bird protectionists, and we shall not be called upon to settle fine points and follow difficult boundaries. We need not know anything about plumage, and never have to decide whether the wings used by milliners are really those of food birds, or the pinions of song birds disguised with dye. Or if the fearfully manufactured confections are the heads of real Owls and Parrots twisted out of all semblance to nature, or merely compounds of Chicken feathers and celluloid. ”

“ Only in the cassowary and emu among adult birds is the aftershaft as large as the main shaft.
There are several different kinds of feathers—contour feathers, semiplumes, down-feathers, filoplumes and powder-down. Contour feathers, as their name implies, are those which form the contour or outline of the body, and are all that can generally be seen. Those which form the “flight feathers” of the wing, and the tail feathers, are the most perfectly developed. Semiplumes are degenerate contour feathers. ”

“ Drawing it out would be very painful to the bird, and might injure the wing so that the next feather that grew would be defective. The stumps of the feathers are allowed to remain until they are dead and dry, when they are drawn out easily. In South Africa the Kafirs draw the stumps out with their teeth. ”

“ The shaft of the feather is split and the web is cut narrow, and tapered off to a point at each end (Fig. 181) . The ends of the feathers are fastened to the stele with whippings of fine sinew, the small end of the feather which, of course, comes at the nock, being often wedged into a slit in the wood (with a special tool to be described below) , or else doubled back over a few turns of the whipping and lashed down with the rest. The small end of the feather is almost always twisted about one turn, evidently to make the arrow revolve in flight, like a rifle ball. ”

“ The feathers begin to fade in a short time and for this reason have little commercial value, but the amateur Northern tourist feather hunter has not known this, or disregarded the fact, and has been the cause of the depletion of the species in the United States. Almost every one could cite instances similar to the above, for there are many people in the {155} United States who are guilty of taking part in the destruction of birds for millinery purposes. In addition to the feathers of American birds already mentioned the feathers of certain foreign species have been very much in demand. ”

“ An accurately drawn feather in such cases would be easily recognized; but the feathers made by the ancient Hopi decorators of pottery were not accurate representations—they were symbolic. The only way we can identify them is by association. Having determined the head, body, legs, tail, and wings of an animal which must be a bird, we examine the separate components which form the tail and conclude what part represents a tail feather. ”