LAND BIRDS. 511 
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION. 
Adult in summer (sexes alike): “Wing and tail about the same length, the tail usually 
a little longer; upper parts without any rusty; top of head pale raw-umber brown, broadly 
streaked with black and divided by a distinct median stripe of light brownish-gray; light 
brown ear-coverts bordered above by a very distinct postocular streak of dark brown or 
dusky, and along lower edge by a rictal streak of the same; whitish malar streak usually 
bordered below by a more or less distinct grayish or brownish streak along each side of 
throat; hind neck and sides of neck ashy, in more or less marked contrast with brown 
of ear-coverts and crown; back light brown, broadly streaked with black. In winter the 
colors much browner, obscuring gray of neck and strongly tinging chest and sides. Young: 
Upper parts more buffy or ‘clay-colored,’ with blackish streaks broader and less sharply 
defined; dusky postocular and rictal streaks less distinct (sometimes nearly obsolete); 
chest, sides and flanks, streaked with dusky. 
Length about 5 to 5.75 inches; wing 2.20 to 2.50; tail 2.30 to 2.60” (Ridgway). 
233. Field Sparrow. Spizella pusilla pusilla (Wils.). (563) 
Synonyms: Field Chippy, Bush Sparrow, Ground-bird, Ground Sparrow.—V'ringilla 
pusilla, Wilson, 1810.—Emberiza pusilla, Aud.—Fringilla juncorum, Nutt.—Spizella 
agrestis, Coues, 1875.—Spizella pusilla, Bonap., 1838, and most recent authors. 
Resembles both the Chipping Sparrow and the Tree Sparrow, but the 
entire bill is reddish yellow, there are two conspicuous whitish wing-bars, 
and the tail is longer than the wing. The head and back are reddish brown, 
the latter streaked with blackish, and the under parts are ashy or soiled 
white without any dark breast spot. 
Distribution.—Eastern United States and southern Canada, west to the 
Plains, south to the Gulf States and Texas. Breeds from South Carolina, 
southern Illinois and Kansas northward. 
The Field Sparrow is a common summer resident of old pastures grown 
up to woods, and the edges of woods, throughout the southern half of the 
state. It is one of the species very frequently confounded with others, 
and in trying to map its exact distribution in the state the utmost difficulty 
has been found. We have scattering reports of its presence not only all 
over the Lower Peninsula, but from half a dozen points in the Upper 
Peninsula, most of which are undoubtedly erroneous. We have perfectly 
reliable reports from all the southern part of the Lower Peninsula as far 
north as Bay county and Newaygo county, about 433°, and it was also found 
sparingly in Crawford and Oscoda counties, by Wood and Frothingham, 
in 1904. Mr. S: E. White states that from 1889 to 1891 it was fairly common 
as a summer resident in certain localities on Mackinac Island. Probably 
this must be considered one of its northernmost breeding places, for the writer 
has searched for it personally in half a dozen places in the Upper Peninsula 
without success, and among the thousands of birds killed on Spectacle 
Reef Light in northern Lake Huron, the Field Sparrow has never been 
found. Blackwelder lists it from Iron county (Upper Peninsula) with the 
remark that it is common only in the more settled regions where there are 
open fields and hedges (Auk, XXVI, 369); Ruthven and Gaige failed to 
find it in Dickinson county in the summer of 1909 (MS. Report). Like 
half a dozen other sparrows it is known as “Ground Bird” and ‘Field 
Sparrow,” and probably the reports from the Upper Peninsula relate to 
the Savanna Sparrow, Tree Sparrow, Chipping Sparrow and Vesper Sparrow. 
It arrives from the south in April, the first part of the month in the 
southern sections of the state, and the latter part farther north. Mr. Swales 
gives his earliest spring record near Detroit as March 19, 1903, and his 
