54 BULLETIN 19 7, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



I found that the grassy plains had been thoroughly burned over to 

 improve them for grazing purposes ; the long-billed curlew, formerly 

 abundant there, had entirely disappeared, and the beautiful little 

 chestnut-collared longspurs were nearly gone. The prairies and their 

 fascinating bird life will soon be merely a delightful memory ! 



Sprague's pipit, therefore, is probably disappearing from most of 

 its former habitat. William Youngworth, of Sioux City, Iowa, tells 

 me that he spent a few days during the summer of 1939 near Cando, 

 N. Dak., to learn something about this pipit. He says that, although 

 Dr. Koberts (1932) found it so common in the Ked River Valley a 

 few years ago, it is not common any more. "One can drive now for 

 hundreds of miles in North and South Dakota and never hear or see 

 a pipit." 



Nesting. — Frank L. Farley says in his notes : "For years I tried to 

 find the nest of this bird by careful searching but was never success- 

 ful. Later, however, I stumbled onto several nests by accident. A 

 few years ago, when sitting in my car on the large open flat on my 

 farm on Dried Meat Lake, my attention was directed to the songs of 

 several of the pipits that were soaring and singing some hundreds of 

 feet above me. It looked up and, just as my eye met one of them, the 

 bird instantly started its downward plunge to earth. On reaching a 

 point about 20 feet from the ground, its mate flew out to meet it. My 

 suspicion that the female had just left its nest was correct as, on 

 going over to where I had first seen it, I had no trouble in locating 

 the nest with five eggs. It is quite probable that further investigation 

 might prove that this meeting of the birds in the air just above their 

 nest is a regular habit." 



Audubon (1844) was the first to discover the nest of Sprague's 

 Missouri lark, as he called it; the nest, he says, "is placed on the 

 ground and somewhat sunk in it. It is made entirely of fine gi^asses, 

 circularly arranged, without any lining whatever." 



Dr. J. A. Allen (1874) seems to have been the next to find the nest, 

 of which he says : "The only one found by me was arched over, and 

 being placed in a tuft of rank grass was most thoroughly concealed. 

 The bird would seem to be a close sitter, as in this case the female 

 remained on the nest till I actually stepped over it, she brushing 

 against my feet as she flew off." 



Several others have described the simple nests of Sprague's pipit, 

 but the nests are not essentially different from those described above. 

 The most elaborate account of the nesting life of this pipit is furnished 

 by R. D. Harris (1933), who found a nest near Winnipeg, Manitoba, 

 on August 24, 1931, after the young had hatched. The nest was 

 placed on the shoulder of a grass-grown roadway across a pasture 

 field, in a hollow made in muddy weather by passing cattle. Mr. 

 Harris writes : 



