LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN WAG- 

 TAILS, SHRIKES, VIREOS, AND THEIR ALLIES 



ORDER PASSERIFORMES (FAMILIES PRUNELLIDAE, MOTACIL- 

 LIDAE, BOMBYCILLIDAE, PTILOGONATIDAE, LANIIDAE, STURNI- 

 DAE, AND VIREONIDAE) 



By Arthur Cleveland Bent 

 Taunton, Mass. 



Order PASSERIFORMES 

 Family PRUNELLIDAE : Accentors 



PRUNELLA MONTANELLA (Pallas) 

 MOUNTAIN ACCENTOR 



CONTIUBUTED BY BERNARD WiLLIAM TUOKER 

 HABITS 



There are two records of this Siberian bird in Alaska, the first 

 referring to a specimen taken by C. G. Harrold on Niinivak Island on 

 October 3, 1927, and recorded by Swarth (1928). The second is of a 

 male taken at Camp Collier, St. Lawrence Island, on October 13, 193G, 

 and is recorded by Olaus J. Murie (1938). It was obtained by Mrs. 

 Murie in 1937 from an Eskimo, Jimmie Otiyohok, whose wife had 

 learned to prepare bird skins and who had recognized this as an unusual 

 visitor. 



It is only in the more southern parts of its range that this species, 

 like a number of other Arctic forms, is confined to mountains. Far- 

 ther north, as Seebohm (1901) has pointed out, it is essentially a bird 

 of the Arctic willow swamps. Dybowski (in Taczanowski, 1872) 

 states that in southeast Siberia, though it is tolerably common in 

 spring, only a few remain to breed in the more elevated portions of the 

 mountains. He met with old birds in company with fledged young in 

 the forests of cedar mingled with firs at the foot of the Chamardaban 

 Mountains at the south end of Lake Baikal. More recently Stegmann 



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