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



Howell's list quoted above. The few observers who mention food 

 were probably unable to get near enough to these secretive little 

 sparrows to identify any item but an occasional large insect — a grass- 

 hopper or a cricket. 



We may reasonably expect the food habits of Bachman's sparrow 

 in the northern parts of its range not to differ materially from those 

 of the southern birds in the proportions of animal and vegetable food 

 taken, though an actual analysis would doubtless show variations in 

 the species' consumption. 



Behavior. — Most observers who have had experience with Bach- 

 man's sparrow will agree, I believe, that were it not for the unmis- 

 takable ringing song, this secretive little bird could be overlooked in 

 any given territory for a long time and its presence never suspected. 

 That is actually the case in winter in the South when the birds are not 

 in song. When it comes to elusiveness, I class Bachman's sparrow 

 with the notoriously secretive Henslow's and LeConte's. 



Observers in the northern parts of the breeding range of this species 

 designate its singing perches as fences and tall weeds and seldom 

 mention a higher perch. In the pineries of the South, however, the 

 usual singing perch is in a tree, and I do not now recall ever having 

 noted any other. The favorite perch is within 20 feet of the ground 

 on the stub of a broken branch of a pine tree or on one of the dead 

 twigs one often sees halfway up the trunk of a mature long-leaf pine. 

 The bird seldom goes as high as the crown branches. 



Early morning and late afternoon seem to be the preferred singing 

 periods, but even the heat of a summer day is no deterrent to this 

 indefatigable singer as I have often heard his song ringing out through 

 the shimmering noontime heat in the southern pineries. 



Singing persists until late in the summer in all parts of the range. 

 Maurice Brooks (1938) mentions having heard the song a few times in 

 August in West Virginia. In the Pensacola, Fla., area, I have heard 

 it as late as the last week of August. Alexander Sprunt and E. 

 Burnham Chamberlain (1949) note that the song can sometimes be 

 heard in coastal South Carolina in early September. They also record 

 sporadic singing "late in December." 



Maiu^ice Brooks (1938) records the unusual, perhaps unique, ex- 

 perience of having had Bachman's sparrows come to a feeding shelf on 

 his farm in Upshur County, W. Va., where they learned to relish 

 "exotic" foods that they certainly never found in nature. He ^vrites: 



Much to our surprise, a pair of the birds, evidently nesting in a nearby brushy 

 field, frequenting one of our window feeding shelves. No similar circumstance 

 had come to our attention, and we tried a variety of foods with the birds. They 

 took raisins freely, but, like so many birds which we have fed, seemed to prefer 

 the kernels of black walnuts to any other food which we could offer them. They 



