Vesper Sparrow

About the Vesper Sparrow

A streaky brown sparrow of open grassland, the Vesper Sparrow is best known for the flash of white outer tail feathers it shows as it flushes, along with a subtle chestnut shoulder patch and a clean white eye-ring that lend a tidy look to an otherwise plain bird. It takes its name from a poetic notion that it sings most sweetly in the evening.

Vesper Sparrows favor sparse, open country - overgrazed pastures, plowed fields, and grassy roadsides - where they forage on the ground for seeds and insects and flush up to a fence wire when disturbed.

In Texas the Vesper Sparrow is mainly a cool-season bird, scattered across open fields and prairies from fall through early spring.

A note from behind the lens: work slowly along a field edge or from a vehicle, watching for a bird that flushes to a low wire or clod. Get to its level, keep the background a clean wash of field, and catch the white tail-edges and rusty shoulder in warm, low light.