196 The Short-Toed Lark 



Family— ALAl'DID.-Ji. 



The Short-Toed Lark. 



Ciila)idixlla bnuhydaityla, LEISL. 



HOWARD SAUNDERS admits that this species has been "justifiably 

 placed in the geuus Calandrclla, characterized by the absence of crest, a 

 stout conical bill, straight and short hind-toe, and infinitesimal bastard 

 primary." I, therefore, see no advantage in continuing to call it Alaiida. 



Inhabits Southern Europe in summer and is resident in Spain and Portugal, 

 as well as the Canaries and North-west Africa ; in winter it occurs in North-east 

 Africa and southward as far as xAbyssinia ; eastward it breeds in Persia, Turkestan, 

 and North-west India. 



To Great Britain the Short-toed Lark is a rare straggler, about nine 

 authenticated instances of its occurrence in England having been recorded, si.x 

 of them in autumn, one in April, and one in July : of these one was obtained on 

 the Scilly Islands, one in Hampshire, four in Sussex, one in Cambridge, and one 

 in Shropshire: in 1890 one caught near Portsmouth was exhibited at the Crystal 

 Palace. In 1904, a female was caught on the Outer Hebrides, and it has occurred 

 once in Ireland. 



The general colouring of the male in breeding-plumage is pale rufous or 

 sand3'-browu, with dark brown centres to the feathers ; the central tail-feathers 

 are smoky-brown, the remainder blackish, but the two outer feathers have 

 pale huffish patches, similar to the white patches on the tail of the Sky-Lark ; a 

 white superciliary streak; under parts white, suffused with pale buff on the breast 

 and flanks ; a few dark streaks on the sides of tlie neck ; bill dark brown, paler 

 below ; feet j^ellowish horn-brown ; iris hazel. The female resembles the male 

 in plumage, but is peculiar in having both wing and tail longer than in the male. 

 The young have all the feathers of the upper parts tipped and bordered with 

 buff. After the autumn moult the plumage is redder. 



Colonel Irby ("Ornithology of the Straits of Gibraltar") says:— "On the 

 Andalucian side. of the Straits the spring arrival commences about the middle of 

 March, and the passage continues for a month later, at which time nests with 

 eggs may be found near Gibraltar. Excessively abundant, as above stated, in 



