All birds New World Sparrows
.jpg){kind=link}
Field Sparrow
Spizella pusilla
Here all year.
Recorded by Timothy Marquardt. CC BY-NC-SA 4.0, via xeno-canto, trimmed and volume evened out.
Look for
- A pink bill and pink legs.
- A rusty cap on top of the head, and a thin white ring around each eye.
- A plain, gray-brown face and chest with no streaks. Males and females look alike.
A little about it
Field Sparrows live in Oklahoma all year. They usually travel in small flocks of 5 to 15 birds. In winter, they often team up with juncos and other sparrows, like Harris's Sparrows.
They feed on the ground or in low plants. To reach grass seeds, one may fly up onto a stem and bend it all the way to the ground. In winter they eat mostly small seeds. In summer, bugs make up most of their food. At feeders they eat millet, on the ground or from a low tray.
The nest is a cup of grass on or near the ground, in a clump of grass or a low bush. The female lays 3 to 5 eggs. The babies can fly when they're about 2 weeks old. A pair can raise 2 families in a year, and sometimes 3.
Its song is a string of soft whistles on 1 note that speed up into a trill at the end. You might hear it even on hot summer days, when most birds are quiet.
Fun fact
If something wrecks their nest, Field Sparrows try again fast. One female in Illinois tried to nest 10 times in a single season.
When it's here
- January: here
- February: here
- March: here
- April: here
- May: here
- June: here
- July: here
- August: here
- September: here
- October: here
- November: here
- December: here
Taller bars mean more sightings. Most often seen in March.
How big
5 to 6 inches. A small sparrow with a long tail.
Where to look
Brushy fields and the edges of woods, where grass and bushes grow together. It's rare in towns and yards.
People have spotted it at Lake Stanley Draper, Lake Hefner, Lake Thunderbird State Park.
Could it be something else?
Chipping Sparrow
In winter, a Chipping Sparrow may have a pink bill too. Check the eye. A Chipping Sparrow has a dark line through it, and a Field Sparrow's face looks plain.
White-crowned Sparrow
Young White-crowned Sparrows look a lot like a Field Sparrow. They're bigger, with no eye ring, and most have 3 tan stripes on the head.
Where these facts come from
- Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation field guide
- Audubon Guide to North American Birds
- When it's here: Sightings shared on iNaturalist in the 8 counties, all years.