When I was 10 years old, my grandmother gave me Roger Tory Peterson’s classic nature book “A Field Guide to the Birds” for Christmas. It quickly became one of my most prized possessions.

I spent hours poring over Peterson’s evocative illustrations, dreaming of charismatic species I’d never seen, like great grey owls and scarlet tanagers. I even had my mother quiz me on the flight silhouettes at the back of the book until I knew them by heart.

Seeing my growing interest, my parents bought me my first pair of binoculars for my 11th birthday, and my father and I built a bird feeder together. Mounted on a wooden pole in our backyard on Wallis Drive, it didn’t take long for the birds to find it.

The feeder was soon visited by blue jays, chickadees and even stunning, noisy flocks of evening grosbeaks. By far the most frequent guests, however, were house sparrows.

A stranger among the sparrows

One morning in October 1963, I noticed a bird that seemed just a bit different from the rest of the flock. While it shared the same streaky brown back and thick bill, something about it felt “off.” As I watched more closely, I caught a glimpse of a drab, yellow wash across the breast and noticed that the eyebrow stripe, rather than the typical buff of a female house sparrow, was a dingy yellow.

The female house sparrow (left) and female dickcissel can appear strikingly similar —at least they did to my novice birdwatcher eyes back in 1963. Identifying the rarity on my own, and having that discovery confirmed by local naturalist Doug Sadler, cemented the species as my “spark bird.” (House sparrow photo by Drew Monkman. Dickcissel photo by Dan Sudia).

I grabbed my field guide and began searching for anything that might match. As luck would have it, I found a potential look-a-like on the same plate of colour drawings........

© Peterborough Examiner