Well, I pushed the send button before I was finished with the last post. I
meant to inquire about both the tree sparrow and give more info on the
putative ptarmigan.
The sparrow had a small rusty cap, overall grey head with slite
rusty eye streak, yellow bill and distinct white wing bar. No streaking on
breast. I initially thought that it was a chippie but when I finally got a
good look at it and obviously wasn't. Anything else that this could be? I
certainly wouldn't expect it in this environment.
I was also somewhat baffled by the "ptarmigan". Of the 2 birds
that I saw clearly one had baring all the way down the central tail
feathers, the other (the one that fanned its tail) had lateral black
feathers. The former bird had white wings patches low over the abdomen.
The beak was quite short on these birds and both had dull reddish, small
eye patches that were somewhat caudally displaced. These seem to have many
characteristics of rock ptarmigan but not all. So... the questions. Can
grouse and ptarmigan hybridize? Would ptarmigan be turning white by now?
(The snowshoe hare that I saw on this trip had not started to turn yet).
Mary