Fox Sparrow
Passerella iliaca

Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Subphylum: Vertebrata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Emberizidae
Genus: Passerella

Audio for Species

Song
Song

from Macaulay Library

Species Related Links

Additional Fox Sparrow Pictures

Description

Length: 5.91-7.13 in (15-18.1 cm) Weight: 0.88-1.52 oz (25-49 g) Wingspan: 7.1-8.66 in (18-22 cm)

The Fox Sparrow has dark rusty-brown to gray upperparts; the wings and tail sometimes same color as back, sometimes rustier. A thick malar streak and boldly striped and an irregular spot in the center of the chest. They have a conical bill with a yellow lower mandible.

Habitat, Range, and Feeding

The Fox Sparrow is a familiar dweller of streamside thickets and chaparral across the northern boreal forest, taiga, and western mountain regions of North America.
They nest in bushes, on the ground, or in low trees. The female builds the nest out of small twigs, shredded wood rotting wood, strips of bark, dry grasses, mosses, and lichens for the outer wall. She uses for the inner cup dead grasses, roorlets, hair, feathers, lichens, and moss; monofilament fishing line if she can find it. The clutch size is 2 to 4 eggs, that are pale bluish green to raw sienna, well marked with blotches of burnt sienna. They are oval in shape.

Their diet is mainly arthropods,mostly insects like beetles, weevils, ants, caterpillars, occasionally spiders, millipedes, and small mollusks. They also eat seeds and fruits, sometimes plant buds.