DESCRIPTION AND TECHNICAL OBSERVATIONS.
Genus Ammodromus. Swainson, Zool. Jour. III. p. 348. (1827.) Ammodromus rostratus. (Cassin.) Emberiza rostrata. Cassin, Proc. Acad., Philada., VI. p. 184. (1852.)
Form. Short, and rather heavy; bill lengthened, strong; wings with the first, second, and third quills longest, and nearly equal; tail rather short, emarginate; legs and feet moderately strong.
Dimensions. Total length of skin, about 5¼ inches; wing, 2¾; tail, 2 inches.
Colors. Entire plumage above dull-brownish and cinereous, every feather longitudinally marked with the former, and tipped and edged with the latter, the brown stripes being most strongly marked on the head and back; narrow superciliary lines ashy-white; throat and entire under-parts white, with longitudinal stripes, and arrow-heads of brown on the breast and flanks; stripes of this character forming lines on the sides of the neck from the lower mandible, above which are stripes of white; abdomen and under tail-coverts dull white; wings and tail brown, edged with paler shades of the same color, nearly white on the outer-webs of the external feathers of the tail, deeper and tinged with rufous on the wing-coverts and exposed edges of the secondaries; bill and feet light-colored, the former brownish above (in dried skin).
Hab. California. Spec. in Mus. Acad., Philada., and Nat. Museum, Washington.
Obs. We are acquainted with no species which this bird resembles in any considerable degree, though its general characters are similar to the birds that we have mentioned in the present article. Its bill is remarkably large and strong, and its entire organization robust.
PLECTROPHANES McCOWNII.—Lawrence.
McCown’s Bunting.
PLATE XXXIX. Adult Male and Female in Summer Plumage.
It is not only in the spring, or at the advent of the month sung by the poets as the real birth of the year, that everywhere in the temperate regions of North America, hosts of feathered travellers arrive, either to remain for a season, or to continue their journey to more northern countries. In the autumn and winter, also, troops of them constantly appear, succeeding each other in some measure according to the earlier or later setting in of winter, or the greater or less severity of that season. Nearly all of the autumnal species, like our summer visitors, proceed to the South to spend the winter—others, coming later, remain during the whole of the winter, and are constantly recruited by new comers of the same species, but at the first opening of spring, return to their homes. Some, as the Purple Finch and the little Snow-bird, come every winter—others, as the Pine Grosbeak, the Northern Linnet, and the two species of Crossbills, only occasionally. Though abundant, perhaps, for one season, years may elapse before either of the birds last mentioned will be seen again by the most diligent collector. At the time of writing the present article (December, 1853), both the White-winged Crossbill and the common Crossbill (Loxia leucoptera and americana), are abundant in the neighborhood of Philadelphia, the former of which has not before been seen here since the winter of 1835-6. The latter appears more frequently.
In addition to these, we are visited by flocks of several species that are to be found here rearing their young in the summer; but while our bird reared in Pennsylvania has taken an excursion to the South, so his Northern namesake, reared, perhaps, at Hudson’s Bay, has done the same, and made Pennsylvania the limit of his journey. The Robin (Merula migratoria) is an instance of this description of migration. This bird, in large flocks, is to be met with almost every winter, especially in New Jersey, and wanders much further southwardly and westward. We fancy that we can distinguish a stranger of this species from one “native and to the manor born.” The Northern Robin is slightly a larger bird than our summer resident; his colors are a shade darker, and his bill decidedly a clearer yellow. Though not presenting characters sufficient at all to raise a suspicion of distinction in species, the northern bird is clearly of a different race. And so it is, too, with the Red-winged Blackbird, the Meadow Lark, the Golden-winged and the Red-headed Woodpeckers, and other species, all of which come here in the winter from more northern latitudes, and in most of which close observation will detect small characteristics of difference in race.
Plate 39
McCown’s Bunting
Plectrophanes McCownii (Lawrence)
The spring migration is confined to birds that pass the winter in the South, in many cases not beyond the limits of the United States; but there are birds that extend their journey to the islands of the West Indies, to Mexico, and to Central America, and in some instances to South America. Many of the Warblers, several of our common Thrushes and Finches, and various others of our well-known North American species, visit Cuba and Jamaica in the course of the winter, and in both those islands some of them make their appearance while yet the season is not so far advanced in the United States as to incommode them either by the cold or an abridged supply of their favorite food.
The migration of these birds is a curious problem, and regulated by laws entirely independent of the considerations of climate and supply of food. One cannot readily find a reason why a bird that has passed the winter in a tropical or southern latitude, should leave for the North at the coming of spring, when a more plentiful supply of food than has sufficed for its winter support is about to be presented. And then, too, why should birds proceed so far to the North?—to the very confines of the Arctic circle, as many small species do, when the great forests of the middle and northern States offer ample accommodation, and supplies of food certainly equal to those in which they will at last terminate their journey. There are questions here difficult to answer. It would appear that the existence of an animal is predicated on its performance of certain functions antecedently involved in its organization. That its entire history, we may say, is but an answer to the calls of organization. That the organization and the performance of its indicated functions are strictly exponents of each other, the latter modified by circumstances, and the relations of species to each other, dependent in some measure on circumstances, but not produced by them, no more than forms or other physical characters. No feature in the history of an animal is absolutely produced by circumstances. There is, too, the consideration of inherited instincts, and if the faculty of memory, and impressions on it, are transmissible, nearly the whole phenomena of instinct may be explained.
In the western and southwestern countries of North America, within the limits of the United States, various species of northern birds appear in winter that have never been noticed on the Atlantic seaboard. The handsome little bird that we present to the reader in the plate now before him, is one of that description. It appears to be a native of the extensive and little-known regions of northwestern America, migrating in the winter to California, New Mexico, and Texas, where it has been seen by several of our naturalists.
There are several species in Western America of the group to which this bird belongs, all characterized by agreeable and somewhat similar colors. In the States on the Atlantic, the Snow Bunting (Plectrophanes nivalis) is their only relative that is of usual occurrence,—though another, the Lapland Longspur (Plectrophanes Lapponica), occasionally appears, and of the capture of which, in the neighborhood of Philadelphia, several instances have come to our knowledge.
Capt. McCown, who discovered this present species in Texas, gives no further account of it than that he shot it in company with a flock of Shore Larks. His notice is in the Annals of the New York Lyceum of Natural History, VI. p. 14. Dr. Henry has obtained it in the vicinity of Fort Thorne, New Mexico. These, with Dr. Heermann, are the only naturalists that have as yet noticed this bird in its native wilds.
During the survey for a route for a railroad to the Pacific, by Lieut. Williamson’s party, to which Dr. Heermann was attached, he met with this bird in large numbers, and his collection contains numerous specimens in various stages of plumage. From these we have selected adults of both sexes, from which the plate now before the reader has been prepared. In Dr. Heermann’s manuscripts, kindly placed at our disposal for the purposes of our present work, we find this bird thus noticed:—
“I found this species congregated in large flocks with the chestnut-collared Lark Bunting (Plectrophanes ornatus), and engaged in gleaning the seeds from the scanty grass on the vast arid plains of New Mexico. Insects and berries also form part of their food, in search of which they show considerable activity, running on the ground with ease and celerity.
“We found this bird, as well as various other species, particularly abundant whenever we struck on the isolated water-holes that occur in this region, these being the only spots for miles around where water can be obtained. When fired at, or otherwise alarmed, they rise as if to fly away, but seem to be irresistibly impelled by thirst to return to the only localities where relief is to be obtained, and where, if the hunter is so inclined, large numbers of this handsome little bird, and others, may be slaughtered with little exertion.
“From Dr. T. C. Henry, of the U. S. Army, I learned that in the spring, large flocks of this species appear at Fort Thorne, apparently on their return to the North, having migrated southwardly the fall previous, and that they leave on the return of mild weather. In several flocks of these birds I noticed also the Shore Lark (Alanda alpestris), but it formed a small proportion of the numbers.”
The figures in our plate are about two-thirds of the size of life.