WRENS, THRASHERS, ETC. 435 



7'. Back rusty brown. 



Thryothorus, p. 446. 



Fig. 556. 



GENUS OROSCOPTES. 

 702. Oroseoptes montanus (Toinis.). Sage Thrasher. 



Bill much shorter thau head ; rietal bristles well developed ; wino's and 

 tail of equal length ; tail nearly even. 

 Adults: upper parts dull grayish 

 brown, indistinctly streaked ; wings 

 with two narrow white bars ; tail with 

 inner web of 2 to 4 outer feathers 

 tipped with white; under parts whitish, 

 buffy on flanks and under tail coverts ; breast and sides heavily marked 

 with black spots. Young : like adults, but upper parts indistinctly streaked 

 with darker, and streaks on under parts less sharply defined. Length : 8- 

 9, wing- 8.1).5-4.10. tail 3.20-3.8.5, bill .60-.G5. 



Distribution. — Sage plains from Montana south to northern Mexico and 

 Lower California, and from western Nebraska to the Cascades and the 

 Sierra Nevada. 



Nest. — Bulky, composed larg'ely of coarse plant stems, dry sage 

 slireds, and sag-e bark, lined with fine rootlets, and sometimes hair ; placed 

 usually in sagebrush. Eggs: 3 to 5, rich g-reenish blue, spotted witli clove 

 brown. 



The sage tlirasher. and the Brewer, Bell, and lark sparrows, are 

 among the commonest birds of tlie sagebrush country, and the sage 

 thrasher's big gray body with its white tail corners shows from a 

 distance as he disappears with long undulating flight over the face 

 of the sage plain. 



In the land of telegraph poles he often mounts one to sing, but 

 his commonest perch is the top of a tall sage bush, and as his song 

 is poured out even long after dark and sometimes by moonlight, 

 with scarcely less richness than the true thrasher's, you are glad he 

 lives in the deserts. In winter he leaves the sagebrush and wantlers 

 south over the lower valleys. 



GENUS MIMUS. 



703a. Mimus polyglottos leucopterus {Vigor.s). Wkstkrn 



MOCKINCI'.IIU). 



Bill much shorter than head, notched near end; rietal bristles well 

 dev. -loped ; wings rounded ; tail long-er than wings, rounch'd ; tarsus long-er 

 than niiddle toe and claw : scabs of t.u-sus distiiut. Adu/fs: upper parts 

 grayish drab : wings and tail blackish, wings with large white patch at b:i.se 

 of primaries, wing- bars, white-tipped wing (piills. and terti.ils with whitish 

 '■<lgings; under parts white, w.ished with dav coh.r. Younu : more brown- 



ish above ; back indistinctly sjjotted or streaked; breast spotted. Male: 

 wing 4.-JU-4.72. tail 4..".;]-r).32. bill .»;i-.7."). Femnl, : win"; 4.2.")-4.()5. tail 

 4.4;:-.-).()S, bill ..V.>-.71. 



/>>/.s/r/7;M//0H. —Southwestern Unit^-d States from the Gulf of Mexico 



