General Notes. 
Breeding of the Prairie Horned Lark ( Otocoris alpestris praticola ) 
near Pittsfield, Mass. — Sometime since I received a letter from Mr. 
Henry R. Buck, of Weathersfield, Conn., giving a detailed account of the 
discovery of a small colony of Prairie Horned Larks, evidently breeding, 
near Pittsfield, Mass. Although the old birds were not taken, they were 
carefully observed, and Mr. Buck’s intelligent description of them, and 
of the nest and eggs he obtained leaves their identification scarcely open 
to question, as is shown by the following extracts from his letter. Mr. 
Buck writes: “This summer [1892] I became interested in a nest .... 
of Otocoris alpestris, which I thought was only a winter visitor here. 
Mr. C. H. Buckingham of Pittsfield, Mass., with whom I was walking, 
found the nest July 10, 1892. . . . The bird had built her nest in a sheep 
pasture, on the very top of a treeless mountain west of Pittsfield; on the 
ground of course. She could hardly have found a more unprotected 
spot, and had not roofed over the nest at all. It was about four inches in 
diameter, sunk even with the surface of the ground, and was composed 
of a thick wall of moss lined with dry grass, several locks of wool, and 
two or three leaves. 
“The eggs were four in number, fresh , of about the same shape as an 
English Sparrow’s, of a pale greenish ground color, spotted indistinctly 
but thickly with light brown and purplish. The spots are not at all 
clearly defined and not perceptibly thicker at one end than at the other. 
The eggs measure .62 X .84, .61 X .85 and .61 X .83 inches. No. 4 got 
cracked, so I did not measure it, but it was about the size of the others. 
“We could not get a very close look at the bird, since she would sneak 
off when we were yet quite a distance from the nest, and after she had 
gone about forty yards would run unconcernedly about, among some 
rocks near there, but would always keep about the same distance away 
from us. If we followed her closely she would fly off with a steady, 
rapid motion of the wings, very like the flight of a Meadowlark. On the 
ground she ran easily and seemed to be able to go quite fast. 
“We saw five or six other birds of the same kind near the place but 
could find no other nest. The birds were a little longer than a Bluebird — 
I should say about seven inches — but much plumper and stouter, reminding 
one of a Meadowlark in this respect. They were brown above and white 
below, with the sides of the head below the bill, and also the throat, 
white, and a narrow black spot, shaped somewhat like a sickle, across the 
breast. I did not notice any black streaks on the sides of the head or the 
horns, but as I did not get very close, and did not look for them especially, 
it is not strange. 
“On a second trip to the place, a week later, there was a very high 
wind blowing and we saw nothing of the birds.” 
This form of the Horned Lark has been already recorded as breeding 
in North Adams and Williamstown, Mass. (Faxon, Auk, IX, 1892, p. 
201), as well as in Vermont, New Hampshire, and near Troy in eastern 
New York. — William Brewster. Cambridge , Mass. 
Aok XI. Oct. 1894 p. 826-327 
(9-Cc 
Ank, XII, Oct. , 1896, p. 3 . 
(<H)\ (Ho . , 
On the 27th of last June I was delighted to find a little flock of six or 
seven Prairie Horned Larks — probably members of one family — feeding 
in a ploughed field in North Adams, near the edge of Williamstown. 
One of them was in full song. This is the place where Mr. J. B. Grimes 
had told me that this bird breeds (see ‘ Auk,’ IX, 1892, 202). The discovery 
of the nest of the Prairie Plorned Lark near Pittsfield, Mass., by Mr. 
C. II. Buckingham in 1892 was announced in ‘ The Auk,’ XI, 1894, 326. — 
Walter Faxon, Musetnn of Comparative Zoology , Cambridge , Mass. 
