404 Birds of Colorado 



Lazuli Bunting. Passerina amaena. 



A.O.U. Checklist no 599 — Colorado Records — Say 23, vol. ii.p: 47 

 Allen 72, p. 150 ; Aiken 72, p. 201 ; Trippe 74, p. 171 ; Henshaw 75 

 p. 300; Minot 80, p. 230; Allen & Brewster 83, p. 191 ; Drew 85, p. 16 

 Beckham 85, p. 142 ; Lowe 92, p. 101 ; Cooke 97, pp. 19, 109, 217 

 Keyser 02, p. 154 ; Henderson 03, p. 236 ; 09, p. 238 ; Gilman 07, p. 157 

 Markman 07, p. 157; Warren 08, p. 24; 09, p. 16; Rockwell 08, p. 173. 



Description. — Male — General colour above turquoise blue, washed 

 with dusky in the middle of the back ; wings and tail dusky, the middle 

 wing-coverts broadly, the greater coverts narrowly tipped with white, 

 forming a double wing-bar ; lores black ; sides of the head and throat 

 like the back ; chest tawny, paling on the flanks and becoming quite 

 white on the abdomen and under tail-coverts ; iris brown, upper 

 mandible black, lower greyish-blue with a dusky median streak ; legs 

 dusky. Length 4-90 ; wing 2-75 ; tail 2-12 ; culmen -40 ; tarsus -65. 



The female is earthy-brown above, with a slight wash of blueish on 

 the riamp ; tlie coverts are tipped with pale buffy and the under-parts 

 are dirty-white, with a buffy tinge across the chest. Young birds are 

 rather more tawny above and have the blueish tinge on the rump. 

 Young males in the second year have the blue of the back clouded 

 over with cinnamon-brown. 



Distribution. — Western North America, breeding from British 

 Colimibia and South Dakota to New Mexico, south in winter to lower 

 California and the Valley of Mexico. 



In Colorado this Bunting is a common simimer bird on the plains 

 and lower foothills up to about 7,000 feet, occasionally ascending to 

 9,100 feet, at which elevation it was taken by Prof. C. P. Gillette, July 

 7th, 1896, on Little Beaver Creek in Larimer co. It arrives early in 

 May — Aiken's earliest date is the 9th — and breeds towards the end 

 of June. Other recorded localities are : near Greeley (Jlarkman), 

 Boulder co. (Henderson), Bergin Park (Trippe), Lincoln and El Paso 

 cos. (Aiken), Pueblo (Henshaw), and on the west side of the Divide, 

 Middle Park (Carter apnd Cooke), Glenwood, Meeker and Gunnison 

 cos. (Warren), Mesa co. (Rockwell), Fort Lewis (Gilman). 



Habits. — ^The Lazuli replaces the Indigo bird in the 

 west, and has very similar ways ; it frequents open country, 

 where there are low bushes and has a weak and not very 

 melodious or well sustained song, difficult to distinguish 

 from that of the Summer or Mountain Warbler. It 

 nests in a low bush, such as a wild-rose or cherry, and 

 lays three or four blueish-white eggs, generally unspeckled, 



