ALASKA LONGSPUR 1G09 



comitant ecological simplicity. These are factors which tend to 

 make studies of adaptation and of ecological relations especially 

 rewarding. 



For the vertebrate ecologist or zoologist there is no more suitable 

 subject for studies of such relations than the Lapland longspur, in 

 all likelihood the most characteristic species of vertebrate animal to 

 be found throughout the arctic. The extensive circumpolar breeding 

 range of this species is equaled by few other birds, and the generally 

 consistent high density of individuals over such a vast area is likely 

 not equaled at all. The Lapland longspur is found on the tundra 

 of Kamchatka west through Siberia to Scandinavia, Franz Joseph 

 Land, Greenland, northern Canada, and Alaska. In winter it can 

 be found occupying large areas of southern Europe, Russia and 

 China as well as most of the United States. 



The great bulk of this imposing range is occupied by one subspecies, 

 lapponicus, while two others, coloratus (Commander Islands, 

 Kamchatka), and alascensis (Alaska, N. Yukon, N. W. Mackenzie) 

 occupy more restricted areas. In Alaska, principal breeding area 

 for the race alascensis, the distribution conforms essentially to the 

 treeless coastal regions and islands. These include a relatively broad 

 belt of tundra extending from the Arctic coast south and west along 

 the Chukchi and Bering Sea to the base of the Alaska Peninsula. 

 Westward in the Aleutian Islands the range extends to Attu (Murie, 

 1959). More peripheral range includes a small nesting group on 

 Middleton Island in the Gulf of Alaska (Rausch, 1958), St. Lawrence 

 Island (Fay and Cade, 1959), and the Pribilof Islands (Preble and 

 McAtee, 1923). In the interior of Alaska longspurs occupy areas 

 above timber in scattered localities including the Talkeetna Mountains 

 (Schaller, MS) and the central Alaska Range (Dixon, 1938). 



The habitat these small birds occupy within this geographic range 

 includes nearly all that of open character. Generally excluded are 

 the extremely wet marshlands and meadows except as these contain 

 more elevated areas such as hummocks or ridges where nests can be 

 placed. The very xeric communities such as the Dry as and lichen- 

 clad rocky fellfields of the hills and mountains are also avoided. 

 Otherwise, in such widespread arctic and sub-arctic vegetation as 

 sedge tussocks (Eriophorum) , the meadow-like tundra of Carex, low, 

 ankle-high areas of willow (Salix), and in expanses of low dwarf- 

 birch (Betula) intermixed with various heaths, the Lapland longspur 

 is the most numerous bird of the north. 



The subspecies of Lapland longspurs are differentiated primarily 

 on the basis of color. For the most part the differences are slight, as 

 pointed out by the following brief review. F. G. Salomonsen (1950) 

 believes the longspurs of Greenland, on the basis of a larger bill and 



640-737—68 — pt. 3 24 



