FINCHES, SPARROWS 



(600) Passerina versicolor 



versicolor (Bonap.) (Lat., various 

 colored, as it certainly is). 



VARIED BUNTING. Ad. d' — 

 Plumage as shown by the lower bird; 

 head, shoulders and rump bright blue, 

 becoming purple on the back and 

 imder parts; back of neck bright red. 

 Ad. 9 — As shown by the upper 

 bird; upper parts brownish, tinged 

 with bluish on the wings and tail; 

 under parts dull brownish-white. 

 Young birds have bufty wing bars and 

 are white below but have the breast 

 strongly washed with brownish. L., 

 5.25; W., 2.60; T., 2.10; B., .40. Nc.'it 

 — Of grasses, bark and rootlets; in 

 forks of bushes in thickets; three or 

 four pale bluish-white eggs, .75 x .58. 



Range — Lower Rio Grande Val- 

 ley in Tex. 



instance of ever seeing his mate perched even as high as ten 

 feet above ground. Hers is a lowly position down among the 

 bushes and the briers. In fact, it is quite unusual to dis- 

 cover a female Indigo anywhere except in the immediate 

 vicinity of the nest. At all other times they are so very 

 inconspicuous or conceal themselves so well that one rarely 

 notices them. 



LAZULI BUNTINGS, except in plumage, are the western 

 counterparts of Indigo Buntings. Although common west 

 of the Rocky Mountains, they are found to the eastward only 

 in western Texas. They frequent the chaparral chiefly in 

 the warm valleys of the Sonoran zone but, like Green-tailed 

 Towhees, which are found in the same localities, they fre- 

 quently follow the chaparral to higher zones. Their songs 

 are unmistakably finch-like but not as sweet as that of the 

 last species, having a well-defined burr to the notes something 

 like the song of the Lark Sparrow. 



VARIED BUNTINGS are a handsome species not 



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