﻿40 Birds 



centipedes, fresh-water molluscs and small worms, with an 

 addition of seeds in winter when insect food is scarce. 



This bird has the upper parts olive-brown, each feather with a 

 central dark stripe ; a whitish streak over the eye ; wings dark 

 brown, the primaries with yellowish margins, the secondaries and 

 coverts margined with whitish; tail dark brown, with the outer 

 pair of feathers half white and the second pair with a white apical 

 spot ; under-parts mostly white, the sides of the neck, breast and 

 flanks streaked with brown-black ; bill, legs and feet horn-brown, 

 the hind claw longer than the hind toe. 



SKY-LAEK. 



Alauda arvensis. 



Throughout the United Kingdom the Sky-Lark is of general 

 distribution, abundant and partially resident. In autumn the 

 number of resident birds is greatly added to by enormous flocks 

 which arrive on our shores from the Continent. 



Although the Sky-Lark commonly frequents moors, heaths and 

 uplands generally its favourite haunts are meadows and arable 

 land, where it does a great amount of good by feeding on various 

 noxious insects and their larvae, and on seeds of weeds during the 

 winter ; occasionally it is destructive to generating corn, and it also 

 feeds on small worms, centipedes and spiders. The Sky-Lark is 

 one of the most beneficial birds to agriculture. 



The nest is invariably in a depression on the ground, more or 

 less sheltered by the side of a tussock of grass ; it is rather loosely 

 made of dried grasses and lined with finer grass-stems. The eggs 

 vary from three to five ; they have a ground-colour of greyish or 

 bufnsh- white, sometimes of a greenish hue, and are usually rather 

 densely mottled with olive-brown. 



The colouring of the upper parts is golden-brown, with blackish 

 central streaks to the feathers ; over the eye is a light buffish 

 streak ; quill feathers dark brown, margined with buff and tipped 

 with whitish ; tail-feathers dark, edged with rufous-buff, outer 

 pair mostly white, second pair with the outer webs white ; under- 

 parts buffish-white, streaked and spotted with dark brown on the 

 throat, breast, and flanks ; bill dark brown above, lighter below ; 

 feet yellowish-brown. The female is smaller and its wings 

 shorter, but otherwise the sexes are similar. 



