On Mon, 11 Jan 1999, Russell Rogers wrote:

> At my banding site at McChord, I banded around 50 SOSP at my winter
> banding site which was near a wetland. I color-banded these bird expecting
> that some would move into nearby areas for breeding, areas where I was
> going to closely monitor the breeding populations of several species of
> passerines. These areas were less than 100 meters from my winter banding
> site. When spring came and birds started nesting activities, I was very
> suprised that I saw none of the SOSP that I color-banded in my study
> sites! This was also true for Spotted Towhee. A few of the SOSP stayed at
> the wetland to breed, most however, went somewhere else. I concluded, that
> they chose other habitat types over the one that I was studying (shruby
> grasslands and oakwoodlands. The other habitat nearby was large
> Douglas-fir with a dense shrubby understory. I would be will to bet my
> banding pliers that is where the SOSP ended up, but I don't know for sure.

I should have mentioned that our study site at Discovery Park is more like
the shrubby understory to Doug Firs that you mention than like your
wetland. Wetland habitats like your winter banding site (e.g. Spencer
Island in Everett, Jetty Island hedgerows, also in Everett) are also where
I have seen big sparrow concentrations in winter, especially after a snow
(15 song sparrows in sight at once on a path). This is what I was thinking
of when I wrote that wintering migrants might turn up in specific
habitats. But, in staring at these birds, I don't see one in fifty that
looks any different from the local rusty race, and so I'm inclined to
agree with Russell that these winter concentrations come from nearby
wooded habitats, and return there in the spring to breed. It's a tough
question to answer definitively, especially with long-distance recoveries
of small bird bands being so low. Maybe we need a local Sparrow Research
Group to follow the detailed histories of individual song sparrows,
tracking them with tiny transmitters, poised to follow them with airplanes
when they move... :)

Chris Hill
Everett, WA
cehill at u.washington.edu