WESTERN MEADOWLARK 95 



grasshoppers apiece. Maximum numbers of 66 cutworms and of 32 

 grasshoppers have been taken from a single stomach. As the time 

 of digestion is about four hours, three times the average must be 

 consumed daily." 



Fall. — After the last brood of young are strong on the wing, old 

 and young gather into groups or larger flocks and begin their late 

 summer wanderings, both regional and altitudinal. Fred M. Packard 

 (1946), writing of such movements in Colorado, says that "in late 

 summer, they increase in numbers through the mountain parks and 

 may even be found then above timberline. They leave the mountains 

 in September and early October." 



John G. Tyler (1913) witnessed a heavy concentration of these birds 

 in the Fresno district of California: "October 10, 1905, just at sundown 

 I witnessed a flight of Meadowlarks unlike anything I had ever seen. 

 A very large flock of these birds, estimated at about one hundred and 

 twenty-five, came sweeping in from a half-section of stubble, and 

 settled for just a moment in an adjoining vineyard; then the whole 

 mass arose again and in a compact body flew back to the stubble. 

 In every movement this flight was suggestive of ducks and the flight 

 resembled a flock of Sprigs coming in from some irrigated wheat 

 field, settling for an instant on a pond and then again taking wing." 



The fall migration of the western meadowlark is not greatly ex- 

 tended or very conspicuous, for the bird is mainly resident over most 

 of its breeding range. It amounts to a gradual withdrawal from the 

 more northern summer haunts, or from regions where its feeding 

 grounds are covered with snow. Even in California, according to 

 Grinnell (1915), in the "highest localities, which are subject to snow- 

 fall, there is evidently an exodus of meadowlarks for the winter, and 

 in complementary fashion many birds winter on suitable portions of 

 the Colorado and Mohave deserts, where the species in unknown in 

 summer." 



Winter. — Even as far north as Montana, according to Cameron 

 (1907), the western meadowlark sometimes stays for the whole winter, 

 "During the last winter, 1906-1907, no less than seven Meadowlarks 

 remained on Mr. Al. Johnson's property situated on the outskirts 

 of Miles City." 



Referring to Oregon, Gabrielson and Jewett (1940) say: "During 

 the winter the birds withdraw somewhat from the State and those 

 remaining gather into small wintering bands that seek the sheltered 

 valleys during the worst weather. In late February or early March, 

 they increase in numbers as the migrants move north." 



The Point Lobos Reserve, on the coast of Monterey County, 

 Calif., seems to be a favorite winter resort for this species. Grinnell 

 and Linsdale (1936) write: "In the open portions of Point Lobos the 



