City Slickers

I worked in Boston today and decided to spend a little bit of time in the AM over at Post Office Square since its on my way to the office from South Station. Post Office Square has a lovely public garden right in the middle of the city which serves as a mini-haven for birds who are migrating and those who call it their home either seasonally or year round. As soon as I got there I could hear the very familiar House Sparrows but then I heard the call of the White-throated Sparrow and realized there were quite a few of them there including the immature one above who is foraging with a Rock Pigeon.
The most amazing thing about these Boston White-throated Sparrows was the fact they were not their usual elusive selves. I was able to get fairly close to them with no fear on their part. They would even land on the crowded sidewalks right next to the House Sparrows which is by far the oddest thing I have ever seen a WT Sparrow do.
It got me thinking while continuing my walk to work at just how adaptable birds are and what I saw was yet again evidence of that. Most of the encounters I have with these sparrows is me putting my binoculars on them while they are in the middle of thick brush and I have to pish them out for a better view. These birds didn't even need pishing they were just mixed in with the other city birds right in the middle of the grass and paid no attention to the many people who walked past them.
My guess is that many of them have spent other winters here and just accept people, noise and nuisance birds as their every day life on their wintering grounds. The birds adapt to city life just as much as people do when making Boston their home. Very interesting.
And my last photo is proof of the hard time I have getting decent pictures of this bird. For some reason every time I try and get a photo of them it comes out over exposed or blurry. Check out the picture above. Everything around it is crisp and clear except for the bird! Go figure!

Take care everyone.