I -JO THE BREWER SPARROW. 



Chipping Sparrows are very devoted parents and the sitting female wih some- 

 times allow herself to he taken in the hand. The male bird is not less sedulous 

 in the care of the young, and he sometimes exercises a fatherly oversight of 

 the hrst batch of babies, while his mate is preparing for the June crop. 



No. 51. 



BREWER'S SPARROW. 



A. O. U. No. 562. Spizella brevveri Cassin. 



Description. — .Idiilts: Upperparts grayish brown, brightest brown on back, 

 everywhere ( save on remiges and rectrices ) streaked with black or dusky, narrow- 

 ly on crown, more broadly on back and sca]Hilars, less distinctly on rump ; wing- 

 coverts and tertials varied by edgings of brownish butf ; flight-featliers and rectrices 

 dark grayish brown or dusky with some edging of light grayish brown ; a broad 

 pale bufifv superciliary stripe scarcely contrasting with surroundings ; underparts 

 dull whitish tinged on sides and across breast by pale hufiy gray. Bill pale 

 brown darkening on tip and along culnien ; feet pale brown, iris brown. Young 

 birds are less conspicuously streaked above ; middle and greater coverts broadly 

 tipped with huffy forming two distinct bands ; breast streaked with dusky. 

 Length 5.^0 (1.35); wing 2.44 (62): tail 2.^8 (60.5): bill .38 ("8.8): tarsus 

 .68 (174K 



Recognition Marks. — Warbler size ; general streaked appearance ; absence 

 of distinguishing marks practically distinctive ; sage-haunting habits. 



Nesting. — Nest: of small twigs and dried grasses, lined with horse-hair, set 

 loosely in sage-bush. Eggs: 4 or 5, greenish blue, dotted and spotted, sometimes 

 in ring about larger end, with reddish brown. Av. size .67 x .49 (17x12.4). 

 Season: April. June; two broods. 



General Range. — Sage-brush plains of the West, breeding from Arizona to 

 British Columbia and east to western Nebraska and western Texas ; south in 

 winter to Mexico and Lower California. 



Range in Washington. — 0])en country of the East-side, al)undant summer 

 resident: occasionally invades Cascade Mountains (only in late summer?). 



Migrations. — Spring: Yakima March 29, 1900. 



Authorities. — ["Brewer's sparrow," Johnson, Rep. Gov. W. T. 1884 (1885), 

 22]. Dawson, Auk, XIV, 1897, 178- D-'. Ss'. Ss-'. 



Specimens. — LT. of W. P. C. 



IT IS never quite fair to say that Nature produces a creature which 

 harmonizes i>erfectly with its surroundings, for the moment we yield tribute 

 of admiration to^ one creature, we discover amid the same circumstances 

 another as nearlv perfect hut entirely different. When we consider the Sage 

 Sparrow we think that Nature cannot improve much upon his soft grays 

 by way of fitness for his desert environment; but when we come upon the 

 Brewer Sparrow, we are ready tO' wager that here the dame has done her 



