Black-chinned Sparrow

Sandhill CranesI like a bird that announces itself: the Vermilion Flycatcher that I saw on my last morning in Tucson or the Acorn Woodpecker with its familiar cackle and flaming red head. The more subtle birds become, but are not as immediately loveable. I learned on this trip to Arizona that the flycatchers that don’t vocalize are maddening—did the tail flick up or down? It matters. Sparrows also fall into this category of work to love. You have to pay attention to the details. The mustard eye line. The streaking on the chest—is it fine or splotchy? The rufous patch on the wing.  On this trip, I was ready to give sparrows all of my attention.

Learning my ducksJanuary 18, 2012, my friend Deb and I drove from her place in Bisbee, north to Whitewater, a series of ponds and grasses, an oasis in the desert. The Sandhill Cranes were landing at Whitewater. This is an event. A large bus was parked in the lot as people walked out to peer at the mass of elegant, tall gray birds with their red crowns. Watching Sandhill Cranes land and take off is a dizzying experience. They flail toward the earth, all legs and wings; at times they seem to stall mid-flight, plummeting to earth. At the same time, others launch toward the air, two birds on a near-collision course. But here’s the thing: you never see two birds collide.

We walked out a breakwater and saw the silhouettes of two roosting Great Horned Owls (satisfying an unending need for owls). A Greater Yellowlegs waded in the water and a Killdeer called as it flew by. There were lots of ducks to enjoy in the impoundments around the cranes. We ate lunch and perfected our duck identifications: there was a Cinnamon Teal with its elegant cinnamon colored head, there were Gadwall, with their black butts, and Pintails with long necks, a white stripe snaking up from the chest. There were rumors of a Sora, which a small army of cheerful photographers waited to document.  

The sun beat down on us in the exposed grasslands. Mid-afternoon I was tired so we headed toward home. I was dreaming of a nap.

“Want to go look for the Black-chinned Sparrow?” Deb asked.

I felt my heart flutter.

“We could walk up M Canyon and look for one,” she said, her eye trained on the road.

I pointed to a red-tailed hawk on a pole, peering out at the vast desert, raw with overgrazing.

M Canyon isn’t really M Canyon, but I don’t want to tell anyone where this is. It’s a secret spot, the sort of place locals keep to themselves.

“Of course,” I said.

We drove to the end of the Canyon and set out, passing a range of make shift homes. A copper-colored dog joined us on our walk, cheerfully bounding ahead, then rejoining us as if we had always belonged to each other. There were stone walls flanking the trail and amidst the grasses mesquite trees. We saw a few Vesper Sparrows in the bushes, but not much else. We pushed on into the Canyon, where it became fantastically quiet. Not a bird in sight. We enjoyed the sense of calm, the shifting, dropping light, the cooler temperatures after a hot day in the sun. But I was starting to feel discouraged.

We headed back downhill to the point we had last seen a bird. We stood. We pished. We gazed into desert brush, at rocky small cliffs.

“There it is,” Deb said with confidence.

I put my bins to my eyes. And there perched the elegant compact gray bird, with a faint black splotch on its chin, announcing itself to the world: Black-chinned Sparrow.