SPRAGUE’S PIPIT. 163 
fertile soil possesses great attraction to the farmer. But the winters of Dakota are long 
and extremely cold, and the blizzards during that season are dangerous to all who 
have to be out of doors. Furthermore, these prairies are almost entirely destitute 
of trees and shrubs. We can look around for miles without espying a single tree to 
serve us as a land mark. Nevertheless, we find on these prairies which are covered 
during summer with tall and dense grasses, many interesting birds. The most 
valuable among song birds and the most characteristic is SPRAGUE’s PipiT, or SPRAGUE’S 
TITLARK, known by the people of that region under the name of Missouri Skylark and 
Prairie Skylark. 
The breeding range of this singular bird extends perhaps from Nebraska northward 
to Manitoba. In his elaborately prepared ‘(Report on Bird-Migration in the Mississippi 
Valley in the years 1884 and 1885” (Washington: Government Printing Office. 1888.) 
Prof. W. W. Cooke says: “‘Sprague’s Titlark breeds abundantly in the Assinaboine 
region, and in Dakota and western Minnesota. Since Dr. Coues, in his ‘Birds of the 
North-West,’ queried, whether Sprague’s Lark left Dakota for the winter, much has 
been learned of its movements. We now know that its winter haunts lie far from 
Dakota, and that it penetrates even to the south of south-western Texas. Just where 
it winters seems not yet determined, but as the record now stands it appears to winter 
below the United States. Mr. Nehrling found it in small flocks near Houston, Tex., in 
early November, but it soon disappeared. Mr. N. C. Brown did not find it at Boerne, 
near San Antonio, Tex., until March 16, so that its winter home must be south of 
these points. At Gainesville, Texas, it was seen as late as May 7. While North Dakota 
and western Manitoba constitute its special breeding grounds, where it nests in great 
numbers, yet it can be found in summer in western Minnesota, in Nebraska (where it 
arrives about the middle of May), and probably also in western Kansas.” 
The Missouri Skylark was discovered by Audubon at Fort Union, June 19, 1843, 
but it remained long unique, until Dr. Elliott Coues, during his connection with the 
Northern Boundary Commission, became perfectly familiar with the bird. This plain- 
colored inhabitant of the prairies may be termed the American representative of the 
famous European Skylark, both in regard to its manners and its exquisite song, 
although it belongs to an entirely different family of birds. Whether its song equals 
that of the European Skylark, future observations will have to decide. The few 
ornithologists that have heard it, speak with enthusiasm of its admirable strain. 
“On several occasions,” writes Audubon, “my friend, Mr. Edward Harris, sought for 
these birds on the ground, deceived by the sound of their music, appearing as if issuing 
from the prairies, which they constantly inhabit; and, after having traveled to many 
distant places on the prairie, we at last looked upward, and there saw several of these 
beautiful creatures singing in a continuous manner, and soaring at such an elevation as 
to render them more or less difficult to discover with the eye, and at times some of 
them actually disappearing from our sight in the clear, thin air of that country.”’ 
Dr. Coues found the Missouri Skylark, one of the most common and characteristic 
birds of all the region, along the 49th parallel of latitude. ‘The ordinary straight- 
forward flight of the bird,’ he says, “is performed with a regular rising and falling, 
like that of the Titlark; but its course, when startled from the ground, is exceedingly 
