Golden-crowned Sparrow Zonotrichia atricapilla Scientific name definitions

Around the turn of the twentieth century, miners of the Klondike and elsewhere in the Yukon Territory, British Columbia, and Alaska knew the Golden-crowned Sparrow as "Weary Willie" because it was forever singing, "I'm so tired!" (Burroughs et al. 1986 Burroughs, J., J. Muir, G. B. Grinnell, W. H. Dall and C. Keeler. (1986). Alaska, the Harriman Expedition, 1899. New York: Dover. Close ). Others called it the "No Gold Here" bird, and disliked it because it repeatedly sang this unpleasant, but often correct, phrase. Perhaps the bleak outlook of the miners, coupled with the remote, often wet, windy, and cold habitats near tree line, influenced impressions of this handsome sparrow; apparently miners had little motivation to document the home life of their avian neighbor.

As one of the more abundant winter birds in shrublands and urban margins of California and Oregon valleys, the Golden-crowned Sparrow quickly gained a reputation for destructiveness in the early twentieth century because of its propensity for flocking and for feeding on vegetables and flowers in gardens and cultivated fields. In recent decades, numbers of wintering individuals appear to be on the increase, and winter diet seems generally unchanged, but the Golden-crowned Sparrow is no longer listed as a pest species.

Despite early interest in the agricultural impacts of this species, and the penetration of civilization into its breeding grounds, the Golden-crowned Sparrow remains one of our more poorly known native passerines.

Several laboratory studies have described physiological mechanisms controlling its migration (Morton and Mewaldt 1962 Morton, M. L. and L. R. Mewaldt. (1962). Some effects of castration on a migratory sparrow (Zonotrichia atricapilla). Phys. Zool. 35:237-247. Close , King and Farner 1963 King, J. R. and D. S. Farner. (1963). The relationship of fat deposition to Zugunruhe and migration. Condor 65:200-223. Close , Farner and Lewis 1971 Farner, D. S. and R. A. Lewis. (1971). "Photoperiodism and reproductive cycles in birds." In Photophysiology: Current topics in photobiology and photochemistry, edited by A. C. Geise, 325-370. New York: Academic Press. Close , Turek 1975 Turek, F. W. (1975). Extraretinal photoreception during the gonadal photorefractory period in the Golden-crowned Sparrow. Journal of Comparative Physiology 96:27-36. Close ), but only one brief published field study from Alaska (Hendricks 1987a Hendricks, P. (1987a). Breeding biology and nestling development of Golden-crowned Sparrows in Alaska. Wilson Bulletin 99:693-696. Close ) describes the reproductive biology of this species. Winter foraging ecology and behavior have been the subject of field studies in California and Oregon (Davis 1973b Davis, J. (1973b). Habitat preference and competition of wintering juncos and Golden-crowned Sparrows. Ecology 54:174-180. Close , Pearson 1979 Pearson, O. P. (1979). Spacing and orientation among feeding Golden-crowned Sparrows. Condor 81:278-285. Close , Dewoskin 1980 Dewoskin, R. (1980). Heat exchange influence on foraging behavior of Zonotrichia flocks. Ecology 61:30-36. Close ), but summer foraging ecology and diet are almost unknown. Thus, knowledge of the life history of this species, especially on its breeding grounds, is constructed largely from scattered notes in journals or brief accounts in volumes describing faunal surveys of British Columbia, the Yukon Territory, and Alaska. Current ignorance about the Golden-crowned Sparrow is surprising, given the number of laboratory and field investigations of other Zonotrichia sparrows; the species offers excellent possibilities for comparative studies, since it is often sympatric year-round with races of the congeneric White-crowned Sparrow (Z. leucophrys). The lack of field studies, especially on the breeding grounds of this species, allows few other generalizations.