Quest for the Elusive Sparrow

What brought us to the prairies of Alberta was not the milk and honey bestowed by the oil Gods, as it is for most who migrate here to build cheap houses and drive trucks for ridiculous wages. It was a small, nondescript sparrow. But not just any sparrow, a BAIRD'S Sparrow! aka Lord Baird. Which as far as sparrows go it's pretty much the most dull, nondescript one in the bird book. We drove to the plains because Baird's only dwells in the northern prairies and is pretty much never seen in migration or winter because it is mythically secretive.

The fuels of a birder's quest

Little did we know we were to get our *bottoms* kicked. As we consulted the vast, endless pastures with our eyes and ears, roads we had been told would bestow the sparrow, we were in for one of the longest, most boring days of our life.

We roasted our eyes in the prairie sun, rosened our backs, invited mosquito probosces into our circulation, and wearied our ears of the incessant song of the over-abundant Savannah Sparrow that dominated these pastures. It was so depressing. Just Savannah Sparrows and cows, everywhere. It was one of the most disappointing, horrendously boring birding days of my life. Dom said "I've never felt so dejected."

Not only could we not located the fabled Baird's, we couldn't find its described habitat: Tall, dense grass. Nor any cool birds. You'd think that somewhere in the Alberta prairies you would be able to locate a patch of Tall, Dense Grass. Apparently this was rare! The cows had consumed it all in order to make the peperettes we were nibbling on, which we recently found out would give us cancer. Not even a baby Swainson's Hawk would eat one.

We went to Dinosaur provincial Park, where T-rexes and Veloci-raptors once terrorized...some kind of herbivorous dinos. Conventional wisdom told us not to enter the long grass, but since when do we follow conventional wisdom? Still, no sign of Baird's. The sun went down, the mosquitoes came out, we camped in cognito in a patch of cottonwoods on somebody's ranch. 

Camping in cognito

We rose at 4 am, determined for revenge. "Let's vacate this mosquito-infested *heck*-hole" said Dom, and our quest continued. I got a little artsy with the camera while we were in the Badlands.

We swept across the grasslands all the way past Brooks, then got slightly lost. Often times when you get lost though, that's when something exciting happens. A Gray Partridge walked across the road, lifer for Dom. An Omen.

Scouring the vast plains at dawn

Then we found a vast field, patched with long grass, the odd sage. This was it, the habitat we'd been looking for. We split up and scoured the fields. Then Dom frantically waved at me from a great distance. I sprinted. Then, panting, I heard the sweet melodious sound of Lord Baird. It trickled into mine ears like a sweet, clear brook, an audible nectar. My heart sang as well.

The field where I made love to Baird's Sparrow for the first time

We staked it for several minutes, then he presented all his nondescript, streaked glory through our lenses, prisms, eyes, then into our brains where it was ingrained forever.

A Baird's Sparrow belting out a sweet song of love

We fell to the grass, exalted.

BUT WAIT! When we viewed him through the scope, we spied a detail that can't be seen in the Sibley Guide illustration, a hidden and precious gem of nature, more valuable than any oil or gas or beef. A subtle but immensely beautiful detail of nature that nearly every Albertan will never, ever get to see or appreciate: the gold-infused crown of the Baird's Sparrow.