Brewer's Sparrows

Sparrows

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The Brewer's Sparrow (Spizella breweri) is a small, slim sparrow.

Adults have grey-brown backs and brown crowns, both with dark streaks, and a pale eye-ring. Their wings are brown with light wing bars and the underparts are pale grey. Their bill is pale with a dark tip and they have a long notched tail. They are similar in appearance to the Clay-colored Sparrow but do not have a pale stripe on the crown or grey neck patch.

There are two distinct populations:

• Spizella breweri breweri is found in brushy areas, especially with sagebrush, in southern parts of western Canada and in the western United States.
• Spizella breweri taverneri is found in thicketed areas around the tree-line in the Rockies of northern British Columbia, the southern Yukon and southeastern Alaska. Some consider this to be a separate species, the Timberline Sparrow. These birds are somewhat darker and larger than the southern subspecies.

The female lays 3 to 4 eggs in a cup nest in low shrubs.

These birds migrate to the southwestern United States south to central Mexico.

These birds forage on the ground or in low vegetation. They mainly eat insects in summer with seeds becoming a more important part of the diet at other times of the year. They usually forage in flocks outside of the breeding season, sometimes with other sparrows.

The male sings to defend a nesting territory. The song is a long varied mix of notes and trills.

These birds have decreased in some parts of their range due to destruction of sagebrush habitat.

This bird was named after the ornithologist Thomas Mayo Brewer.

References

• BirdLife International (2004). Spizella breweri. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 05 May 2006. Database entry includes a brief justification of why this species is near threatened.

(Source: Wikipedia.org)

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