A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 2 of 3Baird, Spencer Fullerton
Science
A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 2 of 3
Baird, Spencer Fullerton
Birds -- North America
Mr. Audubon, who found several of the nests of this bird in Labrador,
near the coast, describes them as large for the size of the bird, and
as usually placed on the ground among moss or tall grass near the stem
of a creeping fir, the branches of which usually conceal it from view.
Its exterior is loosely formed of dry grasses and moss, with a
carefully disposed inner layer of fine grasses, circularly arranged.
The lining consists of very delicate fibrous roots, with feathers of
different kinds of water-fowl. In one instance he noted the down of
the eider-duck. He found their eggs from the middle of June to the 5th
of July. When their nest was approached, the female affected lameness,
and employed all the usual arts to decoy the intruder away. They
raised but one brood in a season, and about the first of September
left Labrador for the south in small flocks, made up of members of one
family.
Their eggs measure from .92 to an inch in length, and .70 in breadth.
They are oblong in shape. Their ground-color is a light bluish-white,
thickly spotted with a rusty-brown, often so fully as to conceal the
ground.
[9] _Passerella obscura_, VERRILL, Pr. Bost. N. H. Soc. IX,
Dec. 1862, 143 (Anticosti). (Type in Museum Comp. Zoöl.,
Cambridge.)
“Size somewhat smaller than that of _P. iliaca_. Legs and
wings a little shorter in proportion. Claws less elongated.
Bill somewhat shorter, thicker, and less acute. Color above
rufous-brown, becoming bright rufous on the rump and exposed
portion of the tail, but a shade darker than in _P. iliaca_;
head uniform brown, with a slight tinge of ash; feathers of
the back centred with a streak of darker brown. Wings nearly
the same color as the back, with no white bands; outer webs
of the quills rufous, inner webs dark brown; secondary
coverts rufous, with dark brown centres; primary coverts
uniform brown. Beneath dull white, with the throat and
breast thickly covered with elongated triangular spots and
streaks of dark reddish-brown; sides streaked with
rufous-brown; middle of abdomen with a few small triangular
spots of dark brown; under tail-coverts brownish-white, with
a few small spots of bright rufous; tibiæ dark brown. The
auriculars are tinged with reddish-brown. Bristles at the
base of the bill are numerous, extending over the nostrils.
Tail rather long, broad, and nearly even. Third quill
longest; second and fourth equal, and but slightly shorter;
first intermediate between the fifth and sixth, and one
fourth of an inch shorter than the third.
“Length, 6.75; extent of wings, 10.75; wing, 3.35; tarsus, 1
inch.
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