. American ornithology for the home and school . rd one of these birds utter a loud, pro-longed call which sounded almost like a wail. The nesting habits of the two species are similar, the pretty cribbeing set on the ground, more or less carefully concealed in the grass,and often skillfully arched over from the rear- One of the questions that has puzzled the scientists and caused somedispute among them is, whether the eastern and western forms are dis-tinct species or only varieties. My own opinion is that they are en-titled to the honor of being called distinct species, and that they do notm
. American ornithology for the home and school . rd one of these birds utter a loud, pro-longed call which sounded almost like a wail. The nesting habits of the two species are similar, the pretty cribbeing set on the ground, more or less carefully concealed in the grass,and often skillfully arched over from the rear- One of the questions that has puzzled the scientists and caused somedispute among them is, whether the eastern and western forms are dis-tinct species or only varieties. My own opinion is that they are en-titled to the honor of being called distinct species, and that they do notmingle together in the marriage relation. Here are some reasons forthis view : First, as has been said, there is a striking difference in their songs-Much as I have listened to them, I am forced to say that the easternlarks almost always pipe the same tune, whether on a Kansas prairie orin an Ohio meadow. This is true even where the two species are des-canting in the same field and at the same moment- On the other hand. 276 AMERICAN Photo by J. T. Little. NEST AND EGGS OF WESTERN MEADOWLARK. I have never known the western lark to steal or mimic the tune of hisfellow-piper. ■ To the statement just made, honesty compels me to admit one appa-rent exception, which will appear from the following quotation from myOklahoma notes: The next morning shortly after daybreak a meadowlark burst into an aria that was new to me, neither the song of theeastern or the western type, but a kind of combination of the two; thisfor a few minutes, and then the merry piper glided into the piercing-melody of a genuine down easterner. Does this incident prove thatthe species sometimes get their songs confused, or that they purpose-ly mimic each other? That problem remains to be solved by the futurestudent. AMERICAN ORNITHOLOGY. 277 However, with this one exception, I have never known the twospecies to borrow one anothers music sheet. In Oklahoma I made some effort to find out whether the t
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