A Sparrow Sort of Day

Last week, we birded along Sweetwater Springs Road – a dry, rocky hillside habitat dotted with oaks. Immediately upon stepping out of the car, we heard a funny jumble of vocalizations we didn’t recognize. We discovered the source to be one of two juvenile Bewick’s Wrens chasing each other around a coast live oak – listen below.

Apparently, this mishmash of trills, wheezes, and buzzes is the first stage in a young Bewick’s Wren’s song development. From the Birds of the World database**:

Male fledglings begin subsong, a soft jumble of adult phrases and note complexes, as they establish territories following dispersal. Peak sensitive period for learning extends from initiation of dispersal (age 30 days) to territory acquisition (age 60 days).

How neat to hear this young male testing out his voice box.
 
Soon, we encountered Violet-green Swallows zipping around, busily searching for flying insects. Much to our delight, a pair disappeared into a small nest cavity in an oak tree! Mom and pop tirelessly delivered food over and over again to the nestlings hidden inside.

We soon encountered the first sparrow species of the day – Rufous-crowned Sparrow! The male in this photo below performed several bars of song while perched atop a log. Eventually, he flew a short distance and landed next to a second bird lurking nearby in the dried grass. The pair quickly copulated twice, then foraged near each other for a while.

Not far from the pair, we spotted a third Rufous-crowned Sparrow. This individual’s streaky breast and muted head coloration indicated it was a juvenile. The youngster wasn’t too wary of us and obligingly perched on the fence just several feet away.

As we ate our picnic lunch, a Western Wood-Pewee joined us and put on quite the show. From an exposed perch, it scanned for flying bugs before launching out to acrobatically catch prey in mid-air. At times, these aerial pursuits brought the bird close enough for us to actually hear its bill snapping shut on a tasty morsel.

Though we didn’t manage to photograph either, listen below to a Bullock’s Oriole fledgling begging incessantly and two rounds of a Black-throated Gray Warbler singing.

The Lark Sparrow was the second sparrow species to make an appearance. These beauties disappeared right into the golden, grassy hillside, but we lucked out a few times when they popped up into the trees. That striking face pattern is a stunner every time!

We captured a quick bout of singing – listen below.

House Wren fledglings were abundant. This little one didn’t appear to be much more than a fluffy sphere with two beady eyes.

As with fledglings of most species, young House Wrens sure are noisy!

While we stood quietly beside a patch of fennel, a gorgeous common buckeye butterfly landed right in front of us, basking momentarily in the sun.

The day’s last sparrow was of the Chipping variety. Though the tall grass concealed the adult Chippies well, one emerged often to feed its fledglings waiting in an oak tree.

Listen here to the hungry youngsters.

What a fun day of exploring a habitat so different from the coast redwoods and douglas-firs we live among! Happy birding to you!
 
 

** Kennedy, E. D. and D. W. White (2020). Bewick’s Wren (Thryomanes bewickii), version 1.0. In Birds of the World (A. F. Poole, Editor). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, NY, USA.