The Vesper Sparrows 



of breast and sides. Length of adult male 146.1-158.8 (5.75-6.25); wing 83.6 (3.29); 

 tail 65.8 (2.59); bill n. 2 (.44); tarsus 21.6 (.85). Female a little smaller. 



Recognition Marks. — Sparrow size; general streaked appearance; white lateral 

 tail-feathers conspicuous in flight; frequents fields and open sage. 



Nesting. — Nest: A depression in the earth, neatly lined with grasses, rootlets 

 and horsehair. Eggs: 4 or 5, pinkish-grayish-bluish white, speckled, spotted, and 

 occasionally scrawled or mottled with reddish brown. Av. size 20.5 x 15.2 (.81 x .60). 

 A set of four from Mono County averages 23.4 x 15.5 (.92 x .61). Season: About 

 June 1st; one brood. 



Range of Poacetes gramineus. — Temperate North America, south in winter 

 to southern Mexico. 



Range of P. g. confinis. — Western North America, breeding in Upper Sonoran, 

 Transition, and Lower Canadian Zones, from southeastern British Columbia, Al- 

 berta, and Saskatchewan, south to central eastern California and Arizona, east to 

 Texas and the middle of the Great Plains region; winters from southern California and 

 central Texas to southern Mexico and Lower California. 



Distribution in California. — Breeds in high mountain meadows in the southern 

 Sierras, and in Transition to Canadian life zones east of the Sierras from the Inyo 

 Mountains north to the Oregon border; winters in the valleys of the San Diego district, 

 rarely to Santa Barbara, less commonly on the deserts, and in the San Joaquin Valley 

 north to Fresno (Tyler). Limits of winter range imperfectly made out, and perhaps 

 indeterminable as distinguished from P. g. a finis. 



Authorities. — Heermann (Emberiza graminea), Jour. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila., 

 ser. 2, vol. ii., 1853, p. 265; Baird, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv., vol. ix., 1858, p. 448 (desc. of 

 confinis); Fisher, A. K., N. Amer. Fauna, no. 7, 1893, p. 85; Grinnell, Pasadena Acad. 

 Sci. Pub., vol. ii., 1898, p. T,6;Judd, Biol. Surv. Bull., no. 15, 1901, p. 58 (food); Tyler, 

 Pac. Coast Avifauna, no. 9, 1913, p. 77 (winter habits in Fresno district). 



A SOBER garb cannot conceal the quality of the wearer, even though 

 Quaker gray be made to cover alike saint and sinner. Plainness of dress, 

 therefore, is a fault to be readily forgiven, even in a bird, if it be accom- 

 panied by a voice of sweet sincerity and a manner of self-forgetfulness. 

 In a family where a modest garb is no reproach, but a warrant to health 

 and long life, the Vesper Sparrow is preeminent for modesty. You 

 are not aware of his presence until he disengages himself from the engulfing 

 grays and browns of the stalk-strewn ground or dusty roadside, and 

 mounts a fence-post to rhyme the coming or the parting day. 



The arrival of the Vesper Sparrow upon its elevated breeding grounds, 

 in late April or early May, according to season, may mark the supreme 

 effort of that particular warm wave; but you are quite content to await 

 the further travail of the season while you get acquainted with this 

 amiable new-comer. Under the compulsion of the sun the bleary fields 

 have been trying to muster a decent green to hide the ugliness of winter's 

 devastation. But wherefore? The air is lonely and the sage untenanted. 



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