644 U.S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 23 7 part 2 



said to have flushed a male lark bunting from a nest containing six 

 eggs near Brule, Nebr., and Gary (1902) reports that from seven 

 nests he examined in Nebraska the male bird was flushed from five. 

 Most other observers agree with Roberts (1936) who reports that: 

 "The male was never discovered assisting in incubation but did take 

 part in the care of the young and was always close by to join the female 

 in protesting any intrusion upon the nest." As Langdon (1933) 

 describes it: "The less-conspicuous female does all the incubating. 

 The male makes his family glad they are alive, not only by singing to 

 them constantly but also by helping feed the dark bluish nestlings." 



Cameron (1908) gives the following description of the development 

 of young lark buntings in Montana: "The usual number of five eggs 

 is laid by June i * * *. The young are fledged by July 1, and, as 

 soon as they can fly weakly (about the middle of the month), sit on 

 the wires with their parents which feed them on grasshoppers." 



Plumages. — Roberts (1936) has provided the best published descrip- 

 tion of the striking changes in plumage of the male lark bunting : 



Juvenal plumage. — Resembles the female but paler above, because of lighter 

 feather edgings causing a scaled effect as in the young horned lark; the markings 

 below are more diffuse; the characteristic wing-patches are present and will serve 

 to identify the bird; the lower mandible is yellowish, upper as in adult. The 

 first prenuptial molt [April] produces the black and white breeding male, except 

 the brown inner primaries, secondaries, and coverts, as described [below], and in 

 some birds various patches of gray and buffy feathers are retained from the winter 

 plumage. 



Second-year breeding. — Secondaries, and all but four outer (black) primaries 

 and their coverts, brown, retained from the juvenal (winter?) plumage; central 

 pair of tail-feathers brown, others black not so pure above. 



Fall and winter adult. — At a complete postnuptial molt, in late July and August, 

 the male becomes somewhat like the female, but the wing-patches are brighter 

 buff, the head and back more rusty, and the feathers of the abdomen are black 

 beneath the light edgings. 



Adult breeding male. — General color black, above grayish or faintly brownish 

 in some specimens; middle and lesser wing-coverts white, forming a large white 

 patch in wing; primaries black, brownish at tips; secondaries tipped with white, 

 and tertiaries margined with white; tail brownish-black, all but middle pair of 

 feathers with terminal white spots on inner web; under tail-coverts tipped with 

 white. Bill bluish-horn color, paler below; leg brownish, darker on feet; iris hazel. 



Adult breeding female. — Very different from breeding male. Above and on 

 sides of head and neck pale grayish-brown streaked with dusky, more sparsely 

 on rump and upper tail-coverts; a light line back of eye and a narrow light eye- 

 ring; below white, streaked with dusky except on throat and belly; some of the 

 feathers on upper abdomen may have concealed blackish centers; markings on 

 breast may coalesce too from a central dark spot, as in Song Sparrow; a dark 

 stripe on either side of tliroat, bordered above by dull white; wings brown, the 

 middle and greater coverts dark centrally, margined widely with dull white or 

 light buff, to form an interrupted wing-patch, less conspicuous than in the male; 

 tertiaries dark, tipped and margined with dull white and buffy; tail as in male, 



