Here’s the start of a new birdsofnewengland.com mini series called Singing in the Spring. It will feature, all together now, birds singing in the spring. The posts will appear randomly throughout this spring.
I’ll kick it off with an eastern towhee. Although a member of the sparrow family, which features mostly small brownish birds, the towhee is larger and much more decorated.
A Day on Merganser Lake
The other day I posted a photo of a chestnut-sided warbler and I remarked how I liked the color chestnut. Today, here’s a rufous-sided towhee. Rufous is a cool color too. Chestnut and rufous sure beat “tan” or “brown.” Of course, it’s not really called rufous-sided towhee anymore. It now goes by the much more boring name eastern towhee. The name changed in 1998 to split it from the spotted towhee of the West.
(Repeat text for context: I’m running out of COVID-19 lockdown themes so from now until things get back to some semblance of normalcy, I will simply post my best photo from the previous day. You could say it fits because of its uncertainty and challenge. I’ll call the series “A Day on Merganser Lake,” even though that’s not the real name of the lake I live near in southwestern Connecticut, it’s just a nod to my favorite duck family.)
Birds of New England.com 