332 LIFE HISTORIES OF NORTH AMERICAN BIRDS. 



This Horned Lark seems to be identical with the one found in northern 

 Euroj^e, wliich, according to Mr. Henry Seebohm, breeds in the exti-eme north- 

 eastern parts of Norway. There are no North American eggs of tliis species in 

 the United States National Museum collection, and no data with the few Euro- 

 pean specimens supposed to belong to this species; judging from their size, 

 however, they are probably correctly identitied. They resemble the eggs of 

 our better-known Horned Larks, which will be more fully described hereafter, 

 in shape and color. There appears to be no difference in their general habits. 



Fi'om three to five eggs appear to be laid to a set, and probably only a 

 single brood is raised in a season. Their length is given by Seebohm as ranging 

 from 0.90 to 0.95 inch, and the breadth from 0.62 to 0.70 inch, or 22.86 to 24.13 

 millimeters in length, Mud 15.75 to 17.78 millimeters in breadth.^ 



126. Otocoris alpestris leucolaema (Couer). 



PALLID HORNED LARK. 



ErcmophiJa alpestris b. leitcolcema CouES, Birds of the Northwest, 1875, 38 (part). 

 Otocoris alpestris leucolwma Ste.jneger, Proceedings U. S. National Museum, V , 1882, 34. 



(B — , C 53h, R 300«,, C 83, U ilia.) 



Geographical range : Western North America from Alaska east to the Northwest 

 Territory, British North America; south in winter, in the western United States, to about 

 latitude 40°. Casually to Long Island, New York. 



The breeding range of the Pallid Horned Lark, owing to the lack of suf- 

 ficient material, is still very imperfectly defined. It appears to be confined to 

 Alaska and to those portions of the Dominion of Canada east of the Rocky 

 Mountains, from about latitude 54° northward to the Arctic Ocean, and there is 

 little or nothing luiown about the eastern limits of its range. 



Mr. E. W. Nelson says: " Throughout Alaska this species appears to be very 

 rare. Two specimens were taken in the vicinity of St. Michaels during my 

 residence there, and tlu-ee were secured on the Upper Yukon by Mr. McQuesten, 

 on April 3 and 30, 1879. All of these birds are spring males and typical of 

 this variety. It is much more common on the head waters of the Yukon during 

 spring and summer than along the shores of Bering Sea, where it can only be 

 counted as a very rare straggler."^ 



In the interior of the Northwest Ten-itory, in about latitude 68°, it appears 

 to be a common breeding bird. 



'Since this was written Mr. Jewell D. Sornborger has deposited three of these eggs in the U. S. National 

 Museum collection, taken by a Sloravian missionary near Okak, Labrador, on June 21, 1892. These speci- 

 mens appear to come from dirterent nests. Their ground color is greenish gray and somewhat darker than 

 that of the rest of our Horned Larks. They are profusely blotched and spotted with dark olive, olive hutf, 

 aud lighter shades of pale lavender. One of the specimens is elliptical ovate in shape ; the other two are 

 ovate. They measure 24.89 by 16.76, 24.13 by 17.27, and 22.10 by 16.26 millimetres, or 0.98 by 0.66, 0.95 by 

 0.68, and 0.87 by 0.64 inch. As the plates had been made up before these eggs were received", none could be 

 figured. 



"Report upon Natural History Collections made in Alaska in the ye.ars 1877-1881, p. 162. 



