Friday’s Feathered Friends-White-throated Sparrow

Posted in Bird Photography, Birding in Nevada, SparrowsTagged , , , , , , , , ,

Copyright ©2024 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. 

PLEASE DO NOT USE MY IMAGES WITHOUT EXPRESSED WRITTEN PERMISSION.

Back in late January or early February I heard there was a White-throated Sparrow up in Carson City. This is a rare bird for Nevada. The map doesn’t show it ever being here rare.

I’d never seen one before so I began the hunt for it. I only had a general location of where it was so I was covering a very large area and staying for hours photographing every sparrow and bird I saw.

I was unsuccessful 6 times over the course of about 6 weeks.

All the while this bird was being seen and reported by one guy almost every day while myself, and my neighbor were not seeing it! I can tell you it was frustrating! During this period there was another one seen, photographed, and reported on the birding site ebird.org up in Reno!

So, my neighbor and I went up and spent hours looking for it but, no joy there either. Sigh.

Then on a tip from a fellow birder who had seen it a week before in Carson City told me the which area I should try looking. I went back last week and hung around the area he suggested and got lucky! 💃💃😀The 7th times the charm!

White-throated Sparrow
White-throated Sparrow profile

Fun Facts:

  • The White-throated Sparrow comes in two color forms: white-crowned and tan-crowned. The two forms are genetically determined, and they persist because individuals almost always mate with a bird of the opposite morph. Males of both color types prefer females with white stripes, but both kinds of females prefer tan-striped males. White-striped birds are more aggressive than tan-striped ones, and white-striped females may be able to outcompete their tan-striped sisters for tan-striped males.
  • Although they look nothing alike and aren’t particularly closely related, the White-throated Sparrow and the Dark-eyed Junco occasionally mate and produce hybrids. The resulting offspring look like grayish, dully marked White-throated Sparrows with white outer tail feathers.
  • White-throated Sparrows typically nest on or near the ground. Occasional nests are built up to 15 feet off the ground in conifers. Usually, these nests are second attempts after a pair has had a ground nest robbed by a predator.
  • The oldest recorded White-throated Sparrow was at least 14 years, 11 months old, when it was recaptured and rereleased during banding operations in Alberta.

I have been birding a lot so have lots of birds to share in the coming weeks.

I hope you all have a lovely week-end.

Nikon D850| Nikkor 500mm PF-e| PS CC 25.5.0

Fun Facts gleaned from allaboutbirds.org

more to come…

62 thoughts on “Friday’s Feathered Friends-White-throated Sparrow”

  1. Fabulous shots and I like the unusual stick setting. When most people think of sparrows they probably think they are quite common but there are so many types that are not so common like your white-throated here. Interesting that they might mate with juncos!

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  2. Your patience paid off! I like the texture of the bush? Or shrub compared to the softness of the feathers of the Sparrow. Interesting facts that they will sometimes mate with a Junco! I have been watching the Juncos outside my kitchen window this morning. 💗

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    1. Thank you so much, Jill! I thought that was interesting as well! How entertaining to watch the Juncos! I’ve been watching White-crown, and House Sparrows at my feeder. The way they line up and sometime bicker is entertaining. 😀

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  4. Hey, Deborah, I am glad you “got your bird” ! It is fun getting one you never seen in your area before. Congratulations.

    “White-throated Sparrow and the Dark-eyed Junco occasionally mate and produce hybrids” Oh, man, I bet that one would be hard to ID.

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  11. Congratulations Deborah ! Your persistence paid off. We have been there and done that with several birds over the years, and when we finally do have the thrill of first sighting, often find them easily at later dates. Like a true birder, we love our lifers and are willing to pursue at great cost, though on these occasions we become twitchers for a moment

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  19. Perseverance pays off, well done!
    Several years back there was a White-throated Sparrow present at a site 180 miles from home for nearly a week. When I got the chance to go, you guessed it, not a sniff! Never to be seen again!
    We get them annually over here (possibly, no probably ship assisted) but that remains the closest to home. Yet we did have a White-crowned Sparrow spend many weeks in a local village which was lovely.
    We only have two sparrow species in the UK.

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  20. I’m glad your persistence paid off. I well remember standing next to a group of birders excited beyond words by the presence of a “whatever.” They all could see it as it flitted around the branches (or claimed they could), but no matter how I tried, I could see nothing but moving branches. After 20 minutes, I said, “I’ll stick to flowers. Even when they’re windblown, they don’t move around!”

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  23. Nice shots, and it is nice to see that persistence does pay off sometimes. Sparrows are my least favorite birds to post in my blog because I have such a hard time identifying them. 🙂

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      1. To be honest, the only one in my area that I could positively identify is the Eurasian tree sparrow, and I think it is one of rarest in the US. At least I still have fun photographing all of them even if I can’t ID them.

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          1. Well, the markings under its eyes are pretty distinct so I won’t take a whole lot of credit for telling it apart from the other sparrows. Plus, another blogger identified it for me the first time.

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