1592 U.S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 237 part 3 



as rapidly as before. Both species sing after the ascent, but the song of the 

 McCown's is louder with the notes uttered more slowly. 



During the peak of breeding intensity, as calculated by Mr. Bent 

 (1908), "the male makes about three song flights per minute, of about 

 8 or 10 seconds duration, feeding quietly on the ground during the 

 intervals of 10 or 12 seconds." 



A. A. Saunders, remembering his days in Montana, writes in a note 

 that the general quality of the song is "sweet and musical, and is a 

 broken warble, that is a group of several rapid, connected notes, then 

 a short pause and another group, and so on to the end of the song. 

 In this the song differs from the Chestnut-collared Longspur, whose 

 song is continuous, without a break. It also differs in that the general 

 pitch is maintained at about the same level throughout the song, where 

 that of the Chestnut-collared grades downward in pitch." 



DuBois (1923) seems to be the only observer to record singing in the 

 female. In Teton County, Montana, from a tent which served as a 

 blind, he kept a series of nests under surveillance. On July 2, 1917, 

 watching a female incubating, he notes, "I was surprised to hear her 

 begin to sing. She sang a very pleasing little song." On July 5 

 when the male approached, "she again sang a little twittering, musical 

 song." DuBois takes into consideration that at each of these occur- 

 rences the male was near. In the first instance, at the close of the song 

 he saw the male drop suddenly into view; "he walked up to her and 

 gave her a large insect, apparently a grasshopper with amputated 

 legs." In his detailed study of 61 nests over three seasons (1915, 

 1916, 1917) Dubois mentions the female singing only in this one 

 instance. 



Though Saunders' (1922) observation lead him to believe that this 

 species "sings from a perch only rarely" and that "the Chestnut- 

 collared Longspur * * * sings from a perch more frequently than 

 McCown's, but still rarely," he writes in a later note that occasionally 

 McCown's will sing from "a wire fence or a stone." Salt and Wilk 

 (1958) note in Alberta, that in its choice of song sites McCown's is 

 similar to the chestnut-collared longspur's. "Both prefer low perches 

 either on the ground or on a fence but not on bushes." The last part 

 of the observation is interesting in its difference from the experience of 

 Mickey (1943) who found in her Wyoming study that perches included 

 shrubs as well as rocks and in one instance the top of a stone pile. 

 She mentions the rabbitbrush (Chrysothamnus sp.?) specifically. 



In Montana, DuBois (1923) discovered that a favorite singing spot 

 was often a rock. Apparently some individuals are more concerned 

 about its actual location than in the kind of perch they choose. Thus 

 DuBois noted that the male of one nest under observation "has an 

 habitual perch on an old kettle which has lodged at the edge of the 



