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



Foraging rufous-crowned sparrows usually keep on or close to the 

 ground, hopping slowly about over or through the herbaceous layer 

 and low shrubs. On several occasions I have seen birds of the race 

 ruficeps apparently foraging in taller shrubs and low oak trees. 



Behavior. — Ever since John Cassin's (1856) first account of the 

 habits of this species, observers have remarked upon the bird's tend- 

 ency to remain hidden when approached. Still it is not so skulking 

 when approached carefully as, for instance, a grasshopper sparrow. 

 J. Grinnell and A. H. Miller (1944) summarize the many earlier 

 comments: "Within the grass and beneath the bushes the birds forage 

 and find retreats from disturbance, staying on or close to the ground 

 most of the time and out of sight in the cover. Flights over the bush 

 tops are rapid and short and usually down hUl. Occasionally when 

 alarmed or curious, and when singing, bush tops and rocks are 

 mounted in order to survey the terrain." 



Though usually not a door-yard bird, the rufous-crowned sparrow 

 may become so where houses have been built on its favored hillside 

 haunts. J. Grinnell (1914a) describes how, at a hillside home in 

 Berkeley, "this ordinarily reclusive species has come to be a familair 

 door-yard bird, even entering the house regularly, when allowed to, 

 to be fed. The parent birds have brought their young there from 

 the adjacent hill-slope for several successive seasons." 



Ordinarily such small family groups of five or six are the largest 

 "flocks" of rufous-crowned sparrows one encounters, for it is quite 

 nongregarious, at least throughout most of California. Some of the 

 earlier reports of compact flocks (such as that by Esterly, 1920) 

 feeding on open garden plots and in trees are almost certainly based 

 on misidentifications. 



Voice. — In my experience rufous-crowned sparrows have three main 

 caU notes. First, and most like that of other emberizids, is a soft, 

 high-pitched sssssp of 1 to 1% seconds duration, which both sexes use 

 throughout the year, apparently as a location or contact note. Second, 

 but heard less frequently than either the first or the third, is a sharp 

 tsip note, the significance of which is not clear, unless it is the same 

 as the short, sharp scolding note "given as rapidly as possible" to 

 which Harriet W. Myers (1922) refers. This brief note also has some 

 resemblance to the louder, more piercing alarm notes of the towhee 

 and other fringillids. The third call which is most characteristic of 

 the species, at least in California, is a nasal dew, dew-dew or tew-tew-tew, 

 with a slight rise and then fall in pitch usually evident in each short 

 note. The notes may be given singly or run on into a long series on 

 occasion. W. L. Dawson (1923) renders the caU by the same syllables, 

 and J. Grinnell and T. I. Storer (1924) very similarly write them 

 kiew, Hew, kew-kew-kew. Harriet W. Myers (1922) implies an r 



