[cobirds] Vesper Sparrow redux

Hi all:

I posted a while back on the problem of juvenile Brewer's Sparrows being reported to eBird as Vesper Sparrows (see below).

For other reasons, I recently ran through a number of Vesper Sparrow photos in the eBird/Macaulay Library photo archive. Unfortunately, I ran across a sizable number of photos entered in the Vesper Sparrow entry that are actually of juvenile Brewer's Sparrows. In the field, take note of size and structure. Vesper Sparrow is a fairly big, bruising beast of a sparrow with a fairly wide medium-length tail and, unless very worn, strongly patterned scapulars. Brewer's Sparrow is a tiny waif of a sparrow with, for its size, an outlandishly long (and narrow) tail and rather plain scapulars.

This is the season in which juvenile Spizella sparrows cause angst and consternation among many birders, as, unlike their parents, they are extensively streaked below (less so, for Field Sparrow). If you've recently submitted photos in the Vesper Sparrow entry to eBird, you might do well to revisit those photos.

It is now the last day of August and the young-of-the-year Brewer's Sparrows have completed or nearly completed their preformative molt out of juvenile plumage. Unfortunately, that fact has not greatly slowed the mis-ID of Brewer's Sparrows at Vesper Sparrows, despite that Brewer's Sparrow in plumages other than juvenile are not streaked below. Just because a sparrow has an eye ring does not necessarily mean that it's a Vesper Sparrow. Please take the last two sentences of the first paragraph of my previous post to heart. I also add that Vesper Sparrows have fairly extensive white in the outer tail. If you are looking at or have photographed an eye-ringed sparrow and there is no white visible on the underside of the tail, it is not a Vesper Sparrow.

Enjoy and good birding AND STAY SAFE (masks save lives).

Tony

Tony Leukering

currently Fairborn, OH

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