Lincoln's Sparrow

“Melospiza lincolni. Lincoln’s Song Sparrow. Below, white, with a broad brownish-yellow belt across breast, the sides of the body and neck, and the crissum, washed with the same; extent and intensity of this buff very variable, often leaving only chin, throat, and belly purely white, but a pectoral band is always evident. All the buffy parts sharply and thickly streaked with dusky. Above, grayish-brown, with numerous sharp black-centred, brown-edged streaks. Top of head ashy, with a pair of dark brown black-streaked stripes; or, say, top of head brown, streaked with black, and with median and lateral ashy stripes. Below the superciliary ashy stripe is a narrow dark brown one, running from eye over ear; auriculars also bounded below by an indistinct dark brown stripe, below which and behind the auriculars the parts are suffused with buff. Wings with much rufous-brown edging of all the quills; inner secondaries and coverts having quite black central fields, with broad bay edging, becoming whitish toward their ends. Tail brown, the feathers with pale edges, and the central pair at least with dusky shaft-stripes. Bill blackish, lighter below; feet brownish.” Elliot Coues, 1884

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