FINCHES, SPARROWS, ETC. 885 



them more interesting than when in flocks, because they 

 are now leading individual lives; but they are still the same 

 trustful, gentle birds, ready to come into camp or to let 

 you examine their nests." During the cooler seasons their 

 food consists of seeds of weeds and grasses and the crumbs 

 found in the dooryards. In the summer time, however, 

 they destroy a large number of adult insects and their 

 larvae and eggs. 



The Pink-sided Junco passes the summer season in the 

 Rocky JVIountain region of Idaho and ^Montana, where it 

 makes a home among the pines. It has been found at an 

 elevation of nearly ten thousand feet. ISIr. Davie describes 

 a nest that was found at an elevation of eight thousand feet. 

 He says this "nest was under a shelving stone, in a little 

 hollow dug out by the parents. It was rather large and 

 compactly built, composed of coarse, dry grasses and with 

 an inner lining of fine yellow straw and hair of the momi- 

 tain sheep." 



At the approach of winter these birds retreat before the 

 icy storms of the mountains and the snows that cover the 

 source of their food to the milder climate of Arizona, New 

 JNIexico, and northern Mexico. 



SONG SPARROW 



The range of the Song Sparrow is eastern North Amer- 

 ica, breeding from northern Illinois north to Hudson Bay, 

 wintering from Illinois and New York to the Gulf. 



Ernest E. Thompson says: "The song sparrow's vast 

 range in a dozen varying climates, its readiness to adapt 



