Dark-eyed Juncos

Quiet, cute, beautiful

The most common Junco in our neck of the woods is the Oregon Junco. It is more colorful than the standard Junco (which is slate gray). As you can see in the photo of a ‘late juvenile’ above, it has a dark hood on its head, and brown coloration with a lighter underbelly.

But the Junco above is not yet an adult, so the coloring is…more colorful. Here’s an example of an adult male Junco with fairly standard markings, sitting on one of our apple trees after fall pruning:

Here’s a photo of a younger juvenile:

It has hints of the adult markings, but I wasn’t sure it really was a Junco at all until I spent some time studying examples online.

For a small bird, Junco’s can strike quite dramatic poses:

Although I do sometimes see the Juncos at our feeders, more commonly they feed from seeds that have fallen to the ground—look down to find them. This is my favorite Junco photo; he was picking at seeds that had fallen from our feeders down to the porch. He seemed to enjoy the safety of his semi-secluded private feeding station.

All photos taken with the Sony 300mm lens. Some were shot with the A1 (now sold) and some with the new A9 III.