PERCHING BIRDS 
LARKS. Family ALAUDID^ 
Grayish 
[473.] Skylark. Alauda arvensis. 
Range.- — Old World, straggling casually to 
Greenland and Bermuda. 
This noted foreigner has been imported and 
liberated a number of times in this country, but 
apparently is not able to 
thrive here, a fact which will 
not cause much regret when 
we remember the experiment 
with the English Sparrow. 
They are abundant in Europe 
and Great Britain where they 
nest on the ground in culti- 
vated fields or meadows, laying from three to 
five grayish eggs, marked with brown, drab and 
lavender. 
474. Horned Lark. 
Otocoris alpestris alpestris. 
Range.- — Eastern North America, breeding in 
Labrador and about Hudson Bay; winters in 
eastern United States south to Carolina. 
This variety of this much sub-divided species is 7.5 inches in length, has 
brownish gray upper parts and is white below with black patches on the breast 
and below the eye, yellowish throat and small black ear tufts. The various sub- 
species are all marked alike, their distinction being based upon slight differen- 
ces in size, variations in the shade of the back, or the greater or less intensity 
of the yellowish throat and superciliary stripe. The nesting habits of all the 
varieties are the same and the eggs differ only in the shade of the ground color, 
this variation among the eggs of the same variety being so great that an egg 
cannot be identified without knowing the locality in which it was taken. The 
present variety build their nests on the ground generally under tufts of grass 
or in hollows in the moss which is found in their breeding range, making them 
of dried grasses and generally lining them with feathers. The eggs are grayish 
with a slight greenish tinge, and are specked and spotted over the whole sur- 
face with drab, brownish and dark lavender. The eggs of this and the next 
variety average considerably larger than those of the more southerly distributed 
varieties; size .92 x .65. 
Horned Lark 
474a. Pallid Horned Lark. Otocoris alpestris arcticola. 
Range. — Breeds in Alaska and winters south to Oregon and Montana. 
This is the largest of the Horned Larks and has the throat white, with no 
trace of yellow. Its nest is built in similar locations and the eggs are like 
those of the preceding species. 
297 
