Fox Sparrow

I’ve made it pretty clear though my many posts about them (like here, here, here, and here), that I really, really like birds. I’ve even gone so far as to say that I’d give up my camera gear before I was willing to give up my binoculars. And it’s true.

This bird is one of my favorites in Alaska, it’s a Fox Sparrow. Fox Sparrows are famous for their diversity, and this guy is a member of the red, or rufous race of eastern North America. Interior Alaska, somewhat strangely, given how far west Alaska is, actually is home to many “Eastern” species of birds. The Boreal Forest of the state’s interior has a lot of similarities to the forests of the northeast and the birds follow the habitat. It’s part of what makes Alaska so diverse.

Anyway, I love Fox Sparrows. Though lacking in colorful plumage they have huge and elegant voices. Their songs are a highly variable series of whistles and buzzes that carry for hundreds of yards through the forests where they live. During May, I did a short stint conducting bird surveys in the central Alaska Range. The area where I was working was a blending zone between two different races of Fox Sparrow. Every place we’d go, even within just a few miles of each other, the birds sounded and looked a bit different. Sometimes they were dark like the Sooty race of southern Alaska, or brick red like the interior race. Other times the birds were mottled, hybrids between the two. They were abundant, and rarely were we out of earshot of one or more.

Bird work happens early in Alaska, and I was rising from bed at 3am or before. It sounds hard, and at times it is, but those pre-dawn areas, cold and crisp, are beautiful and quiet. On clear days, the blue light is rich and still-snowy mountains seemed to glow. But the best part is stepping outside for the first time each morning and hearing the morning chorus of birds come to life. The Fox Sparrow is inevitably led the choir.

About the image: I made this photo in the early afternoon, after a long day in the field. I used my 500mm handheld as I walked around the lodge property where we were basing our fieldwork. A number of Fox Sparrows called the place home, but I slowly moved in on this singing male over the course of 15 minutes. He’d sing, I’d take a few steps, he’d sing, I’d take a few steps. I took hundreds of photos, a few more every time I got a few steps closer. (This is typical in wildlife photography and 99% of those get deleted almost immediately). The bird was perched in the shade of a spruce tree, which helped avoid nasty contrast in the bright afternoon sunlight. Eventually I got within about 15 or 20 feet. When the bird sang one last time before flushing from his perch, I got this photo.

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