little brown bird.

[naturelover]

Hi put a post in a few days ago asking what the differance was between a female sparrow and a dunnok,i still get loads of these small brown birds on my seed feeder in groups of five to six at a time,the feeder has finch seed in, hopeing to encourage the finch family but no luck yet,this morning quite early i was looking down the garden through the patio doors,again lots of these little fellers,trouble is the feeder is quite a way down the garden so to get a shot would be difficult,anyway two were hopping around the patio picking up bits so i stood perfectly still and one hopped right outside the doors,so i got a good look at it,i will try to describe it,smaller than a sparrow,light fawn chest and belly,darker brown on the back of the head,face lighter,dark beak,with light and dark stripey wings,do you think these little fellers are dunnoks because if so i get lots of them,i can see they are much different from the sparrow now as the sparrow is more chunky somehow,the others are what i would call dainty.

[coasty]

Dunnock or Hedge Sparrow, They are one and the same thing... As you rightly say they differ from the House Sparrow ,

Posh people and in the know birders tend to call them Dunnocks, However they will always be hedge sparrows to me,,,

[Tursiops2]

A crucial difference between House sparrows and Dunnocks is the bill - Dunnocks have the thin bill of insect eaters, sparrows have the thick, conical, bill of seed eaters. Dunnocks are also largely ground-feeders, sparrows are much more versatile.
HTH
T2

[Dae]

Well it could be a dunnock. As Tursiops said, the easiest difference is the bill. I have a dunnock photo, see if your bird looks like this one:

Dunnock

[Bad bird watcher]

Dunnocks are ground feeders so I would say the ones on your feeders are most likely sparrows and the ones on the pation dunnocks. They do have 'streaky' breast and wings and red legs I think from the top of my head. Funny how you instinctively know what something is but trying to describe it is another thing.... Oh and the dunnock has a sweet song unlike the happy chirping of the sparrow

Hope this rambling helps....

[Dan Salter]

Well done bad bird watcher as i was just about to post the same thing...dunnocks are ground feeders and to my knowledge i have never seen one on any feeder. So im guessing they are sparrows on your feeders.

[naturelover]

well you do suprise me they look too small for sparrows,but looking at the picture that Dae put on yes i think you must be right,are hedge sparrows smaller than house sparrows if they are this is what i am getting,they seem slimmer than house sparrows is that correct ?also i noticed the dunnok is more reddy brown than the birds i am seeing.

[Jolanta Zofia Nowak]

A Dunnock is a bird with constant, jerky movements. When on the ground, it just can't keep still.

With the benefit of a good view, you can see it has a smaller, generally grey head and a thin, insect eating bill.

Once you get used to it, it's impossible to mistake for a sparrow. What it does have in common with the sparrow is its confiding, human-tolerant nature!

[Dae]

And actually ground-feeding isn't necessarily a constant with dunnocks, I have them always on my bird table in addition to the ground. But the bill is definitely a defining feature. Nice and thin for a dunnock, chunky for a sparrow. Male house sparrows also have dark chestnut helmets with a gray cap on top, and dark bibs. Females are generally plain looking, light streak going through the eye, and no streaking along the belly that I've been able to distinguish.

[naturelover]

Hi dae i also notice in your picture the dunnok has orange legs,i dont think the sparrow has that feature,theirs are brown arnt they ?.