Hello and hope you are doing well in this strange summer minus much travel and vacationing. I thought I’d take you to a few local places in search of LBJs. What is an LBJ you ask? If you have never spent time looking at birds or searching field guides to find their official names, it is a name you can use and people will think you have an inside scoop on bird ID. How can that be bad? I know, rather lame, but still fun.
Actually LBJ is a fun as well as good initial identifier–Little Brown Job. With so many darting brown to grayish brown smallish birds, it is a quick naming start as we look for indicators that will lead to identification such as its size, body shape, size and shape of bill, color pattern, habitat, and behavior.
So here we go, looking at some of the many LBJs here on the Front Range of the Rockies. I’ll be giving you a link to each LBJ to explore more as you desire. Cornell University’s Lab of Ornithology has wonderful online bird guides which explain so many amazing aspects of their unique lifestyles!
You may have seen one of these by you. The House Wren is a small bird with a big personality. Their song is said to be bubbly and so it is. Hit the Listen button on the link to hear for yourself.
The House Wren is common from Canada to the southern tip of South America. They spend the summers across most of the USA, but winters in the southern most states or into Central and South America. It is doubtful you’ll see them by your bird feeder as they live on all types of insects, spiders, and even small flying bugs.
This tiny lively bird is a Bushtit, found in the West on low branches of shrubs and small trees anywhere from neighborhood parks to woodlands. They are very active and often tough to see in the foliage as they hunt for insects, even hanging upside down to secure their prey. It has been said they look like a ping-pong ball with a long tail.
Females look very similar to males but have pale-colored eyes, something I have not seen before. They are also some of the world’s smallest birds. The largest Bushtits are 4-1/2″ from tip of bill to tip of tail, and boy do they move fast.
Although they flock and hunt in small, low to ground trees and bushes, they build a hanging nest in trees up to 100 feet high. Here’s more fascinating information you might enjoy about their hanging nests and social structure thanks to Cornell’s All About Birds website.
The Western Wood-Pewee is less likely to be hidden in foliage. They are considered sit-and-wait predators which makes for nice pictures 😉 Sitting on open branches, they wait for an insect to fly by and then zoom out to catch it returning to the same branch. They are members of the flycatcher family and are sparrow size, about 6″ long.
If you live in the eastern USA, you’ll be seeing the Eastern Wood-Pewee. They look quit similar but their songs are very different. The Western and Eastern live in similar habitat, but the Western live in elevations up to 10,000 feet where Eastern don’t go higher than about 4,500 feet. Their ranges overlap slightly in the Great Plains, but they are not known to interbreed.
Say’s Phoebe is also in the flycatcher family but live in areas bordering on deserts at elevations up to 9,300 feet. Since Colorado Springs is high mountain desert, they are quite at home here. A bit smaller than a robin, they have a cinnamon-colored belly, but as on this one, it is not always vivid in color. Many flycatchers have those telltale stiff whiskers around the bill.
Then we have the sparrows. So many LBJs! We start by looking at patterns–no steaks on chest, streaks on chest only or entire front? Eye ring? Different color cap or throat? It is always helpful to discover the most common for the area in which you live too. This is the Vesper Sparrow with a lovely song I hear out my slider all day long.
In this case the rusty cap and small size of the striped bird tells us it is a Chipping Sparrow. As its name implies, its song is a series of chip, chip, chip.
Now we get more complicated. There are lots of female songbirds that are brown. Keeps them safer as they sit on the nest, but tests our observation skills. Sometimes they have the same markings as the male, just not the vivid colors. Sometimes, however, they are very different from their mate. This bird has a heavy bill indicative of a grosbeak but there are no brown, sparrow looking grosbeaks, or are there? First clue? A male Black-headed Grosbeak nearby. Sure enough, this is his mate.
Here’s the heavily streaked female Red-winged Blackbird. The habitat is a sure give away–reeds in marshes near lakes and ponds. Male Red-wings are one of the first signs of spring with females following three to four weeks later.
Most juvenile birds of all species look like the females, also good for hiding more effectively, and the Red-wings are no exception.
This spring/summer I had a number of juvenile birds show interest in getting close to me–an unexpected gift. The parents are lots less excited and the Red-winged mom started dive bombing me.
The Spotted Towhee parents, however, had little concern. Towhees are members of the sparrow family and this youngster is beginning to show the rufous flanks found on both the male and female.
Momma House Finch is easier to mistake for a sparrow, but not when you see her heavier bill and especially when her mate is nearby.
Sometimes we get lucky. We see the back of a bird and it is brownish gray then surprise! It turns around and now IDing becomes much easier. The Yellow-breasted Chat is smaller than a robin but one of the largest warblers.
Then there are just some situations where the only answer is: Look! An LBJ!!
Well my friend, you’ve had a tour of the Little Brown Jobs living near me. Now it may be time to get out and find those LYJs (as in yellow).
Until next time, stay safe and enjoy the songsters in your neck of the woods!
