BIRDS OF INDIANA. 959 



and fields. Usually the last to arrive are the ones that breed with 

 us. They at once make themselves at home upon our lawns, and 

 announce their arrival by the same old song we heard last year. 

 When the migrants arrive very early in the Whitewater Valley, they 

 do not at once begin singing. They usually begin mating the first 

 ten days of April. The earliest date I have is March 27, 1882. I 

 found them building at Brookville, April 15, 1889. April 29, 1896, 

 Prof. W. P. Shannon noted a nest, with four fresh eggs, at Greens- 

 burg. He found a nest, with young recently hatched, May 9, 1896, 

 and I found one with young of the same age, May 9, 1887. Through 

 May and June their nests may be commonly found. Sometimes they 

 rear a second brood. Prof. A. J. Cook notes a nest with eggs taken 

 in Michigan, August 4, 1893 (Birds of Mich., p. 114). Its common 

 note is a sharp tchip, and its song a rapid repetition of tchips, by 

 which it may readily be distinguished. No other bird that frequents 

 similar situations has a song anything like it. The songs dwindle in 

 July and are seldom heard the latter part of that month, and rarely 

 until near the middle of August. In 1897 I heard one singing, July 24, 

 and after that noted but two more songs, one August 12, and another 

 August 14. Mr. Bicknell (The Auk, Vol. II., April, 1885, p. 145) 

 speaks of a later song period, the latter part of September and early 

 in October. I have never noticed it. 



Prof. F. E. L. Beal has shown that about one-third of the food 

 of the Chipping Sparrow, Field Sparrow and Song Sparrow consists 

 of insects, comprising many injurious beetles, such as snout beetles, 

 or weevils, and leaf beetles, many grasshoppers, which form one- 

 eighth of the food of the present species; many wasps and bugs. On 

 the whole, their insect food is mainly injurious species. They are, 

 therefore, beneficial as insect eaters, as well as destroyers of grass and 

 weed seed (Farmers' Bull. No. 54, U. S. Dept. Agr., pp. 26, 27). 



In September, they begin to collect in flocks and frequent weedy 

 places, where they are found in company with other birds, principally 

 Field Sparrows. 



220. (561). Spizella pallida (SWAINS.). 



Clay-colored Sparrow. 

 Synonyms, SHATTUCK, ASHY-NAPE. 



Adult. Bill, reddish, dusky towards tip; crown, grayish-brown, 

 streaked with black, divided by a distinct stripe of pale ashy; stripe 

 over eye, white; ear coverts, light brownish, edged with dusky; nape, 

 ashy; back, brownish, not so rufous as S. socialis; striped with black; 



