McCown’s Longspur 353 
Habits.——Allen found the Chestnut-collared Longspur 
one of the most interesting and characteristic birds 
of the plains in central Kansas; it has a short, 
shrill, but very sweet song, often uttered while on the 
wing. The nest is a neat though slight structure, placed 
on the ground and composed of dry grass and rootlets. 
The eggs, generally five, are blotched and streaked with 
rusty on a white ground. Full fresh sets are to be found 
about June 3rd. 
Genus RHYNCHOPHANES, 
Terrestrial Finches of medium size, closely resembling Calcarius, 
but with a larger and somewhat stouter and more turgid bill and « 
shorter tail, averaging about -57 of the length of the wing; hind claw 
nearly straight and usually less than the hind toe. Plumage streaky, 
tail with a transverse terminal black band ; a chestnut shoulder-patch, 
but no chestnut collar in the male. 
This genus contains only the single species here deseribed. 
McCown’s Longspur. Rhynchophanes mccowni. 
A.O.U. Checklist no 539—Colorado Records—Trippe 74, p. 125; 
Allen & Brewster 83, p. 161; Drew 85, p. 16; Morrison 89, p. 36; 
Cooke 97, p. 101; Warren 06, p. 22. 
Description.—Male in winter—General colour above streaked dusky 
and pale buff, darkest on the crown where the black bases of the 
feathers show through ; wings dusky, edged with buffy or white, the 
lesser and middle coverts chestnut, forming a wing-patch ; tail-feathers, 
except the central pair, which are dusky throughout, white ; outer pair 
very slightly, others more markedly, tipped with dusky ; below dirty- 
white, the black bases of the feathers showing through more or less ; 
iris brown, bill brown, dusky at the tip, legs horn. Length 5-55; wing 
3-50; tail 2-0; tarsus -70; culmen -48. 
By abrasion of the feather tips the male in the breeding season has 
the crown, a rictal streak and a crescent band across the chest black, 
the nape, rump and edges of the wing-coverts slaty-grey, the under- 
parts pale grey; the bill is blackish. The female is like the winter 
male, but the basal black does not show through, and there is no 
chestnut shoulder-patch ; a well-marked broad superciliary and rictal 
stripe of pale buffy contrasts with the darker brown ear-coverts ; 
below, buffy, whitening on the abdomen and throat. The young bird 
is like the female, but with the chest broadly streaked with dusky. 
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