The partly fledged birds, late in June or early in July, have the 
feathers of the crown, back, rump, breast, and throat with black or 
very dark-brown shaft-lines, which, on the breast and throat, are 
narrowed to about one-third the width of the feather. On the crown 
and back the black central markings occupy more than half the width. 
The feathers of the crown are edged with a dingy, yellowish bufif; 
those of the nape with grayish or dull ashy; and of the back and rump 
with a dingy yellowish gray or huffy. There are two indistinct white 
wing-bars. The edges of the breast-feathers are yellowish, with a 
wash of the same on the feathers of the entire under surface. This 
state of plumage is scarcely attained before it begins to give place to 
the fall and winter dress with which we are familiar, when the birds 
come trooping down to the northern United States from the north 
at the commencement of winter. 
Beginning on the lower parts, the feathers are gradually molted 
and replaced, the change extending slowly toward the bill. I am in¬ 
clined to think that the molt commences about the tail and rump. 
It begins late in July or early in August, at which time the old birds 
are already far advanced in their autumnal change. Adult males were 
found with nearly complete winter dress on July 22, and probably 
some change even earlier than this. They usually begin to move 
south before they have fully molted, so that only the comparatively 
few individuals that have completed the molt in September are found 
in perfect winter dress on their northern breeding-grounds. The 
young are out on the wing sometimes as early as the 1st of July, 
but more generally by the 10th of this month, from which time 
they unite in small bands, most of them on the open plains, but many 
frequenting the vicinity of the trading-posts and native villages. 
They remain in great abundance until the last of August or first of 
September, when they commence their straggling departure for the 
South. While in the neighborhood of houses, they are extremely 
heedless of the presence of people, and are nearly as familiar as are the 
English sparrows in our cities. By the first of October, the last one 
has passed away southward. 
Tn winter and early spring the longspurs are very common over 
the prairie-lands of the upper half of the Mississippi River Valley, 
and thence west to Oregon and Washington. 
71 
