Date: Mon, 3 Jun 2002 20:26:22 -0400 Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Janet Millenson Subject: Re: Sparrow question MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="iso-8859-1" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Stan Arnold wrote: "the bill color of these juvenile [sparrows] wasn't just yellow, it was YELLOW." For what it's worth, according to the Birds of North America life history of the Field Sparrow (#103, 1994), young birds are described as having a variety of mouth colors, including "mouth lining yellowish and pinkish near side (Walkinshaw 1939); bill pale yellow with deep pink mouth lining (Saunders 1956); and ... rictal flanges light yellow, with bright red mouth lining (Wetherbee and Wetherbee 1961)." Young birds of many species have a brightly colored gape to help the adults find the feeding target. ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================