Song sparrows live here year around. When the white-crowned sparrow arrives they share territory, ruling bluff thicket and fence, incorporating fence wire and posts into the rituals of song and flirt.
Song sparrows hop side-by-side along the wire, jump to a post-top, then sink together to disappear into a private bower of rose and salal.
The white-crowned sparrow sings (oh-so-often) a melody familiar to me from mountain hikes above Anchorage: “Oh me, pretty pretty me.”
He begins to sing in April, and sings from the top of an ocean spray shrub wavering in the wind against the immensity, compared to his size, of the strait.
