Mr. Bowles finds that eggs may not be looked for in the vicinity of Tacoma before the first week in May, and they are not certainly found before the middle of that month. Open prairie is most frequently selected for a site, and its close-cropped mossy surface often requires considerable ingenuity of concealment on the bird’s part. Ploughed ground, where undisturbed, is eagerly utilized. At other times a shallow cup is scraped at the base of a small fern, or the protection of a fallen limb is sought.
The eggs, from three to five in number, are perhaps the most handsomely, certainly the most quaintly marked of any in the sparrow family. The ground color is grayish white; and this, in addition to sundry frecklings and cloudings of lavender, is spotted, blotched, and scrawled, with old chestnut.
The female sits closely and sometimes will not leave the nest until removed. She seldom flies at that, but steps off and trips along the ground for some distance. Then she walks about uneasily or pretends to feed, venturing little expression of concern. Curiously, her liege lord never appears, either, in defense of his home, but after the young are hatched he does his fair share in feeding them.
No. 41.
SANDWICH SPARROW.
A. O. U. No. 542. Passerculus sandwichensis (Gmelin).
Synonym.—Larger Savanna Sparrow.
Description.—Adults: General tone of upper plumage grayish brown—the feathers blackish centrally with much edging of grayish-brown (sometimes bay), flaxen and whitish; a mesial crown-stripe dull buffy, or tinged anteriorly with yellowish; lateral stripes with grayish brown edging reduced; a broad superciliary stripe yellow, clearest over lore, paling posteriorly; cheeks buffy with some mingling and outcropping of dusky; underparts whitish, clearest on throat, washed with buffy on sides, heavily and sharply streaked on sides of throat, breast, sides, flanks and thighs with dusky; streaks nearly confluent on sides of throat, thus defining submalar area of whitish; streaks darkest and wedge-shaped on breast, more diffused and edged with buffy posteriorly; under tail-coverts usually but not always with concealed wedge-shaped streaks of dusky; bill dusky or dull horn-color above, lighter below; feet palest; iris dark brown. Fall specimens are brighter; the yellow, no longer prominent in superciliary stripe, is diffused over plumage of entire head and, occasionally, down sides; the bend of the wing is pale yellow (or not); the sides are more strongly suffused with buffy which usually extends across breast. Length about 5.75 (146); wing 2.99 (76); tail 2.00 (51); bill .47 (12); tarsus .88 (22.5).
Recognition Marks.—Warbler size (but much more robust in appearance than a Warbler); general streaky appearance; the striation of the head, viewed from before, radiates in twelve alternating areas of black and white (or yellow); larger and lighter than the (rare) Savanna Sparrow (P. s. savanna); larger. darker and browner than the common Western Savanna Sparrow (P. s. alaudinus).
Nesting.—Not yet reported breeding in Washington. Nest and eggs as in P. s. alaudinus.
General Range.—“Unalaska Island (also Shumagin islands and lower portion of Alaska peninsula?) in summer; in winter, eastward and southward along the coast to British Columbia, more rarely to Northern California” (Ridgway). Also breeds extensively in western British Columbia and on Vancouver Island (Auct. Fannin, Kermode, Dawson).
Range in Washington.—Spring and fall migrant on both sides of the Cascades (sparingly on East-side); (presumably) resident in winter west of the range; possibly summer resident in northwestern portion of State.
Migrations.—Spring: April (West-side); South Park April 24, 25, 29, 1894; May (East-side); Yakima Co. May 8, 10, 1894; Fall: September.
Authorities.—Passerculus sandwichensis Baird, Baird, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv. IX. 1858, p. 445. C&S. Rh. Kb.
Specimens.—U. of W. Prov. C.
The interrelations and distributions of the Passerculus sandwichensis group are not at all clear as yet, but the migrant birds of spring and middle fall are usually of this form, and hail from or are bound for the coast of British Columbia and Alaska. At Blaine I have found them skulking about the fish-trap timbers of Semiahmoo spit, during the last week in September; or hiding in the rank grass which lines the little waterways draining into Campbell Creek. At such times they keep cover until one is almost upon them, and then break out with a frightened and protesting tss, only to seek shelter again a dozen feet away.
No. 42.
SAVANNA SPARROW.
A. O. U. No. 542 a. Passerculus sandwichensis savanna (Wilson).
Synonyms.—Savannah Sparrow. Meadow Sparrow. Ground Sparrow.
Description.—Adult: Similar to P. sandwichensis but decidedly smaller and darker (usually browner as well), with bill both relatively and absolutely smaller, and with less or less conspicuous yellow in superciliary stripe. Length about 5.60 (142.2) wing 2.68 (68); tail 1.90 (48.2); bill .41 (10.4); tarsus .82 (20.8).
Recognition Marks.—Warbler size; 12-radiant pattern of head; general streakiness of upperparts; sharply streaked on breast and sides; darker.
Nesting.—Has not been discovered breeding in Washington but probably does so. Nest and Eggs as next.
General Range.—Eastern North America breeding from the northern United States to Labrador and the Hudson Bay country; casual(?) in the Western United States.
Range in Washington.—Imperfectly made out; many birds resident on West-side believed to be of this form.
Authorities.—Bowles and Dawson, Auk, Vol. XXV. Oct. 1908, p. 483.
Specimens.—Bowles, Tacoma, April 28, 1907 (4).
Some specimens we get on Puget Sound are no larger than typical Western Savanna, but are more strongly and brightly colored—handsome enough to be sandwichensis proper. Are these resaturated forms the bleached alaudinus, so long resident in the wet country as to be now reassuming the discarded tints of old? Are they, rather, intergrades between P. s. sandwichensis and P. s. alaudinus, theoretically resident on the lower Sound and in B. C.? Or are they casual overflows of true savanna, ignorant of our western metes and bounds? I do not know. Tweedledum or tweedledee? Here is a fine problem for the man with a gun, to whom a new subspecies is more than the lives of a thousand innocents. But I disclaim all responsibility in the matter.