The new fall birds have not come to visit my feeder as of yet so I went out to discover new birds for myself. Took a short hike to the local prairie and found this Savannah Sparrow, a quite distinguished little fellow and one that I have never noticed before. It turns out that there are a lot of different sparrows around, even in just Illinois and the midwest. My sparrow book has 62 of them listed, along with closely related species like buntings, juncos, longspurs and towhees. So, with COVID, I have gone from world traveler (well, US traveler mostly) to backyard birder in 6 months. Now, I have ventured out to a prairie. Since I have all this photography equipment, I have to shoot someone or something. So, it is birds for now.
