680 
BIRDS OF NEW MEXICO 
Additional Literature.—Merriam, F. A., A-Birding on a Bronco, 81-83, 
189-193, 1896.— Miller, O. T., A Bird Lover in the West, 262-268, 1894.— 
Scott, C. D. W., Educational Leaflet 131, Nat. Assoc. Audubon Soc. 
PAINTED BUNTING; NONPAREIL: Passerrna ciris (Linnaeus) 
Plate 74 
Description. — Male: Length (skins) 5-5.6 inches, wing 2.7-2.9, tail 2.1-2.2, 
bill .4. Female: Length (skins) 4.7-5.5 inches, wing 2.5-2.8, tail 1.9-2.1, bill .4. 
Adult male: Head and back of neck purplish blue in sharp contrast to yellowish green 
or apple-green of back and scapularsj rump and upper tail coverts dull red; tail 
dusky reddish, wing coverts parrot-green, reddish and purplish blue; orbital ring 
and underparts bright red. Adult female: Upperparts plain dull green, underparts 
olive-yellow, brighter yellow on belly. Young in fuvenal plumage: Dusky grayish 
brown above, grayer below, belly buffy or whitish. In their first breeding season, 
the males resemble the female, except for the occasional presence of a few blue 
feathers about the head. 
Range. —Breeds in Lower Austral Zone from southern Kansas, central Arkansas, 
and southeastern North Carolina south to Gulf coast, Texas, and southeastern 
New Mexico; casual in southern Arizona, southeastern California, and southern 
Illinois; winters in southern Florida (a few), Bahamas, Cuba, and from central 
Mexico and Yucatan to Panama. 
State Records. —In its range in New Mexico the Painted Bunting is confined 
to the lower part of the valleys of the Pecos and the Rio Grande. In the former it 
was noted in July, 1901, at Carlsbad (Bailey) as a fairly common summer resident. 
In the Rio Grande Valley it is a common breeder north to Mesilla (Merrill), where 
it arrived about the first of May and left in 1913 on September 30 (Merrill). 
W. W. Cooke. 
Nest. —In hackberry, cat-claw, or chaparral, about six feet from the ground; 
made of grasses and sometimes leaves, lined with finer grasses and hairs. Eggs: 
4 or 5, creamy to bluish white, spotted with purple and reddish brown. 
Food. —Practically all of the vegetable food is weed seeds, two-thirds of it 
being the seeds of foxtail grass, one of the worst weed pests. The animal food also 
is composed almost exclusively of injurious species, more than a fourth of it con¬ 
sisting of the two greatest pests of the cotton crop—the cotton worm and the cotton 
boll weevil (McAtee). 
General Habits. —At our camp above the Pecos River, near 
Carlsbad, all through the hottest days the loud clear song of a Non¬ 
pareil, the familiar cage bird, came up from the mesquite tops on the 
bank of the river; and as we looked down on him we could see now the 
bright red of his breast and now the green sheen of his back; surpris¬ 
ingly gorgeous colors said to be used with telling effect in courtship. 
DICKCISSEL: Spiza ameriedna (Gmelin) 
Description. — Male: Length (skins) 5.5-6.3 inches, wing 3.1-3.4, tail 2-2.4, 
bill .6. Female: Length (skins) 5.5-5.7 inches, wing 2.9-3, tail 2-2.2, bill .5-.6. 
Adult male: Head, back, and sides of neck, gray, top of head usually more or less 
olive-green, back and scapulars brownish streaked with brown and black, rump 
grayish, unstreaked, wings and tail dusky, with light edgings, wings with reddish 
