So what’s the largest sparrow in North America? Like most questions, it’s a trick question, and the answer depends on definitions. If you take North America to be only that part of the continent north of Mexico, and if you take “largest” to refer to weight, and if you’ll agree with me that all emberizids are sparrows, then the answer is Abert’s Towhee.

Abert’s is a truly big bird, weighing nearly 50 grams, almost as much as, say, a female Pectoral Sandpiper. These massive sparrows are common in densely vegetated washes throughout their range, which is one of the smallest of any US sparrow’s: the bird’s distribution centers on the Gila River in Arizona and New Mexico, extending along the Colorado River and its tributaries into Nevada, Utah, and California.

Unlike most of the Arizona specialties, Abert’s Towhee is not a classic “Mexican” bird. This species is downright rare in Sonora, where it just barely follows the Santa Cruz and San Pedro Rivers on their looping courses south of the border; it also occurs at the mouth of the Colorado in Baja California Norte.

I’ve always felt particularly lucky to have a pair of this mega-sparrow in our yard. We live just above Pima Wash, a second-order tributary of the Santa Cruz, and somehow word got out that there was millet to be had at our place. I’d love to have been there to witness that first emergence from the wash: did they fly or did they scamper up the banks and across the neighbors’ yards? Knowing this species’ fondness for shade, I suspect that they slink-slank-slunked from hackberry fastness to hackberry fastness, probably over a period of several days.

Our pair has lost much of its innate shyness over time. They still flutter-flop into the thickets if I open a window, but it’s usually not long before they’re on the seed pile or the suet feeders again, reassuring each other with a long chattering duet that all’s well in towhee land.

Our backyard is nice and noisy now that spring is here. The constant hooting of the White-winged and Mourning Doves stopped suddenly this afternoon, and I looked up to see what they saw: an adult Peregrine Falcon soaring overhead. The strong wind pushed the raptor south and east, and soon enough the noise broke out stronger than before.

It’s hard to know whether this was a migrant or a local bird. As far as I know, the neighborhood was without a resident Peregrine this winter, but our visitor this afternoon may just have flown down from the Catalinas to see what looked good for Sunday dinner. We have the finest grain-fed doves and quail around, after all.

It’s a perfect day in Tucson, warm and bright and calm. Too lazy to actually go anywhere, I’ve been sitting on the back porch reading about Italy and watching the birds: Lucy’s Warblers are moving through in good numbers today, and there’s a mild dispute playing out between the Cactus Wrens and the Abert’s Towhees about the ownership of the newly filled suet feeders.

One of our female Anna’s Hummingbirds has led her still dependent fledgling into the big mesquite over the porch, where it squeaks and screams until she returns to plunge food down its noisy throat.

A lump only a hummingbird mother could love.

She’s been capturing insects all morning, often just a few feet from my chair, but I was utterly unprepared to have her fly up and hover in my face, then land in my hair for a second.

I’m reasonably certain that there’s nothing edible up there, but wonder whether this might not be a sign that I should finally yield to my barber’s urging to a dye job: she apparently mistook the distinguished gray of these curly locks for cobwebs, material for the nest she’ll start to build once she gets rid of that annoying teenager piping at her from the mesquite.