2023-08-30

All about the Nelson’s sparrow

On Aug. 17 I had the privilege of finding and viewing a Nelson's sparrow at Oxner's Beach in Lower LaHave.

Once called the Nelson's sharp-tailed sparrow, it was an easy bird to come by locally. Numbers have been sparse here though during the past few years. It was only the second one that I came across locally this year.

They nest in British Columbia and southern Canada to North Dakota, in the James Bay area of Canada and along the Atlantic coast from Quebec and Nova Scotia south to North Carolina. They winter along the coast from New York to Florida and west along the Gulf coast to Texas.

The Nelson's sparrow is 12.5 to 15 cm long with the sexes outwardly alike. There is a rich buff triangle on the side of the face and gray ear patches and light streaks on a gray brown back. There is a blackish cap and the breast and flanks are pale buff.

The food of this bird is ants, beetles, weevils, grasshoppers, caterpillars, moths, leafhoppers, flies, amphipods, spiders, small snails, seeds of grasses, weeds and wild rice.

I'm a little late writing about the 2021 – 2022 Christmas Bird Count in Nova Scotia as I just recently read the Nova Scotia Bird Society Newsletter Volume 64, Issue 2, Winter 2021-2022. It contained an article written by David Currie with an overview of the count. The Christmas Bird Counts take place between Dec. 14 and Jan. 5.

This particular count was number 122 worldwide. In Nova Scotia, up to the 122nd count we had counted for 107 years. During this particular Christmas Bird Count season, 34 different counts were done in Nova Scotia. People participating numbered 1,078 with 2,033 hours spent and 11,986 kilometres covered by foot, bicycle, boat and car.

The overall picture for the count was 173 species seen during the count days with an additional four species seen during the count week. A total of 270,759 birds were observed, which was about 50,000 more than the previous year. The species that contributed most to this increase were the European starling and 7,300 black-legged kittiwakes off of Brier Island.

The addition of one new species (a scarlet tanager found on the Wolfville count) brought the all time species list for Nova Scotia Christmas Bird Counts up to 295.

Highlights for the 122nd Christmas Bird Count in Nova Scotia were a western willet at Crescent Beach, a little gull at Pictou Harbour, and a Sabine's gull at Sable Island. David comments that a milder late fall and early winter contributed to lingering southern birds such as two eastern phoebes, four species of wrens (house, winter, marsh and Carolina), seven species of warblers, scarlet and summer tanager and two rose-breasted grosbeaks.

Elsewhere, on Aug. 18, Terry Durnavich had two brown-headed cowbirds at Green Bay. Also at Green Bay, Nick Von Maltzahn saw a blue-gray gnatcatcher on August 19. On that same day Lise Bell reported six ruddy turnstones and 11 sanderlings at Crescent Beach.

I counted 280 semi-palmated plovers, 21 least sandpipers, 64 black-bellied plovers, 51 short-billed dowitchers, six lesser yellowlegs and one greater yellowlegs on that day along the causeway at Crescent Beach.

Elsewhere, Aug. 17 produced two great egrets at Malagash for Sylvia Craig, two eastern kingbirds in Argyle for Ronnie d'Entremont and four yellow-crowned night herons at the Guzzle on Cape Sable Island for Mark Dennis.

On Aug. 19, Jim Edsall located a black-billed cuckoo at Hartlen Point and A & G Brown found a great egret at Scots Bay Beach. Zach Wile found a juvenile yellow-crowned night heron at Tignish on August 20.

You may reach me at (902) 693-2174 or email jrhbirder@hotmail.com.