FETNGILLTD.E — THE FINCHES. 



523 



tliat part of the country, though they may have been mistaken for other 

 species. 



Dr. Coues mentions the talcing of a single specimen of this species, Octo- 

 ber 17, on the open grassy plains of Arizona. 



This species is also given by Mr. Sumichrast as a resident throughout the 

 year of the great plains of the plateau of Mexico. From them it occasion- 

 all}^ descends to the distant intervals, as far as Orizaba, or at the elevation, 

 above the gulf-level, of 1,220 metres. 



6282 S 



Plectrophanes maccowni, Lawrence. 



CHESTNUT-SHOULDERED LONGSPUR ; MACCOWN'S BUNTING. 



PI ectmphancs maccowni, Lawrence, Ann. N. Y. Lye. V, Sept. 1851, 122. AVestern Texas. 

 — Cassin, lUust. L viii, 1855, 228, pi. xxxix. — Heerm. X, c, p. 13. — Baird, Birds 

 N. Am. 1858, 437. 



Sp. Char. Male in spring. Top of head, a broad stripe each side the throat from 

 lower mandible, and a broad crescent on jugulum, 

 black ; side of head including lores and band above 

 the eye, throat, and imder parts, ashy-white ; ear- 

 coverts bordered above and behind by blackish, run- 

 ning out at the maxillary stripe. Breast just behind the 

 black crescent and sides, showing dark bases of feath- 

 ers. Upper parts ashy, tinged with yellowi.sh on the 

 mandible, and streaked with dusky ; least so on nape 

 and rump. Lesser wing-coverts ash}^; median chest- 

 nut-brown, with blackish bases sometimes evident; -^'^'■"•«i^''««« "'"ccowwu, Lawr. 

 the quills all bordered broadly externally with whitish, becoming more ashy on secondaries. 

 Tail-feathers white except at the concealed bases and the ends, which have a transverse 

 (not oblique) tip of blackish ; the outermost white to the end ; the two central like the 

 back. Bill dark plumbeous; legs blackish. In winter the markings more or less 

 obscured ; the bill and legs more yellowish. 



Female lacks the black markings, which, however, are indicated obsoletely as in other 

 Plectrojjhanes ; there is no trace of chestnut on the wings, no streaks on the breast. 

 Length, 5..50 ; wing, 3.60 ; tail, 2.50 ; bill, .46. 



Had. Eastern slopes of Rocky Mountains, from Texas to Upper ^lissouri. 



This species varies considerably in markings, but is readily recognized 

 among other Plectrophanes in all stages by short hind toe, very stout bill, 

 and the transverse dark bar at the end of all tail-feathers except the inner 

 and outer. 



Habits. Maccown's Lark Bunting is yet another of the various species 

 of our birds whose history is very little known, and in regard to which the 

 most we are able to state, at present, is that they appear in different parts 

 of the interior plains of the United States, between the Eocky ]\Iountains 

 and the Missouri Elver and the lower tributaries of the INIississippi, 

 extending from New Mexico and Texas northward, during the breeding- 



