A fun mystery … the house sparrow and female red-winged blackbirds would fit with what Alan photographed the next day when he went back out.

FWIW, I cropped this individual out of Alan’s original flock
photo “1-IMG6901-1.JPG”. Not the black bib Aidan mentioned.

Cliff

Hello!

Although I don’t have experience with rosy finches, I do have a
lot of experience with House Sparrows. It looks to me like most of
the birds in the original flock shots from Mr. Gregory are House
Sparrows, with a few female Red-winged Blackbirds and one or two
Dark-eyed Juncos mixed in. House Sparrows, especially the males,
do have a prominent white wing bar that is exposed when they fly,
as is shown by this photo.
I see those wing bars and the black breast of a House Sparrow on
many of the birds in those two photos, in addition to the other
field marks of House Sparrows.

I hope this helps with the identification of these birds!

Happy Birding! 🙂
—
Aidan Lorenz
Caldwell

-- 
Cliff and Lisa Weisse
Island Park, Idaho
cliffandlisa@...

Hello!

Although I don’t have experience with rosy finches, I do have a lot of experience with House Sparrows. It looks to me like most of the birds in the original flock shots from Mr. Gregory are House Sparrows, with a few female Red-winged Blackbirds and one or two Dark-eyed Juncos mixed in. House Sparrows, especially the males, do have a prominent white wing bar that is exposed when they fly, as is shown by this photo. I see those wing bars and the black breast of a House Sparrow on many of the birds in those two photos, in addition to the other field marks of House Sparrows.

I hope this helps with the identification of these birds!

Happy Birding! 🙂
—
Aidan Lorenz
Caldwell