ARGUS BROWN TOWHEE 605 



been established. It seems likely that breeding colonies of this form 

 will be found in other canyons in the Argus Mountains in which willow 

 thickets are present, such as Wilson Canyon." 



Nothing is known about possible variations in its patterns of life 

 history and behavior from those of other races. Davis (1951) sur- 

 mises that a local migration takes place in winter, as he found no 

 brown towhees at Mountain Spring Canyon in December when the 

 ground above 4,300 feet was covered with snow. An apparent 

 vagrant taken at Lone Pine, Inyo County, is the only record for the 

 race away from the Argus Mountains. 



Distribution 



Range. — The Argus towhee is resident in the Argus Mountains of 

 Inyo and San Bernardino counties in California. 



PIPILO FUSCUS PETULANS Grinnell and Swarth 



San Francisco Brown Towhee 



PLATE 34 



Contributed by Henry E. Childs, Jr. 



Habits 



The brown towhee is a widespread species over much of the brush- 

 covered areas of California and the southwest. It is, perhaps, as 

 typically Californian as the chaparral it so commonly inhabits. Be- 

 cause of its drab appearance and uninteresting song, it has until re- 

 cently received little more than casual study by bird enthusiasts. 

 Yet the brown towhee is one of the most common dooryard species 

 in suburban areas near the large cities of California, and an important 

 element of the avifauna of much of the west. 



The many subspecies of the brown towhee range from southern 

 Oregon to southern Mexico and east into Texas. In California it 

 occurs from the lower Sonoran to the Transition Zone (A. H. Miller, 

 1951c). Apparently the species originated in Mexico and spread 

 northward during the Pliocene through a generalized sclerophyll 

 woodland whose elements are called the Madro-Tertiary flora by D. 

 I. Axelrod (1939). This floral association occurred north into Cali- 

 fornia and contained many of the trees and shrubs found in that area 

 today. 



John Davis (1951) has shown that the brown towhees of the United 

 States are divisible into two main groups of subspecies, each geo- 

 graphically isolated from the other. The crissalis group is charac- 

 terized by a low degree of contrast between pileum and dorsum, a 

 dark dorsal coloration, and a relativ^ely long tail. These are the birds 



