There must be a lot of NELSON'S SPARROWs around, because this morning I has one pop up in the wetland to the north of the Lab of Ornithology this morning. It's a new Sapsucker Woods bird for me and in eBird. I saw the bird for about 30 seconds while I was standing on the short boardwalk leading to the Owen's Platform, feeding on a cattail in the narrow water-filled area to the east of the walk. The bird subsequently dropped down and a bit north toward the thick alders that cross the boardwalk. When in view, I had nice looks at the bird (streaked upper breast and flanks with a warm base colour, a smaller sparrow more comparable in size to a chickadee than Swamp Sparrow as judged by the Nelson's Sparrow displacing a Black-capped Chickadee from a cattail, warm tan in the lighter shades on the sides of its head with a narrow grey mid-crown stripe).
Apologies for not posting earlier, as I have just gotten to a place where I could both enter my list on eBird and post this e-mail message. Wesley Hochachka -- Cayugabirds-L List Info: http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsWELCOME http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsRULES http://www.NortheastBirding.com/CayugabirdsSubscribeConfigurationLeave.htm ARCHIVES: 1) http://www.mail-archive.com/cayugabirds-l@cornell.edu/maillist.html 2) http://www.surfbirds.com/birdingmail/Group/Cayugabirds 3) http://birdingonthe.net/mailinglists/CAYU.html Please submit your observations to eBird: http://ebird.org/content/ebird/ --