Contributor
Date
Location
- Age and sex
- Adult, Unknown sex - 1
- Behaviors
- Foraging or eating
Observation details
First noticed birds flitting low across front yards when taking off skis. First thought was a House Sparrow, but birds were darker and proportioned differently--plus this neighbourhood lacks regular House Sparrows. The birds then landed in a scrawny little spruce tree against a trailer house, and I noticed 2 others. They were poking around the little spruce and one or two birds gave a bare patch of gravel on the driveway some quick consideration. At this point, I had no binoculars and the light was starting to fall, but I could make out the plumage as I was only 40 or 50 feet away. Dark birds with grey edging on wing coverts, paler pinkish flanks, grey wedges or helmets above eyes onto crown, with yellowish beaks. A couple times I heard them giving low, chirping calls reminiscent of Evening Grosbeaks or House Sparrows. I lost them for ten minutes when they flew up and behind the houses, but eventually relocated them 100 feet away, where I managed to get these photos and confirmed a fourth bird. I mostly saw them exploring the spruces during my ten minutes with them.
Technical information
- Model
- NIKON D200
- ISO
- 800
- Focal length
- 300 mm
- Flash
- Flash did not fire
- f-stop
- f/5.6
- Shutter speed
- 1/80 sec
- Dimensions
- 682 pixels x 455 pixels
- Original file size
- 60.68 KB