Saxaul Sparrow
Encyclopedia
The Saxaul Sparrow is a passerine
bird of the sparrow
family
Passeridae, found in parts of Central Asia
. At 14 – and 25 –, it is among the larger sparrows. Both sexes have plumage
ranging from dull grey to sandy brown, and pale brown legs. Females have less boldly coloured plumage and bills, lacking the pattern of black stripes on the male's head. The head markings of both sexes make the Saxaul Sparrow distinctive, and unlikely to be confused with any other bird. Vocalisations include a comparatively soft and musical chirping call, a song, and a flight call known.
Three subspecies
are recognised, differing in the overall tone of their plumage and in the head striping of the female. The subspecies ammodendri occurs in the west of the Saxaul Sparrow's range, while stoliczkae and nigricans occur in the east. This distribution falls into six probably disjunct areas across Central Asia, from central Turkmenistan
to northern Gansu
in China. A bird of deserts, the Saxaul Sparrow favours areas with shrubs such as the saxaul
, near rivers and oases. Though it has lost parts of its range to habitat destruction
caused by agriculture, it is not seriously threatened by human activities.
Little is known of the Saxaul Sparrow's behaviour. Often hidden in foliage, it forages in trees and on the ground. It feeds mostly on seeds, as well as insects while breeding and as a nestling. When not breeding it forms wandering flocks, but it is less social than other sparrows while breeding, often nesting in isolated pairs. Nests are round bundles of dry plant material lined with soft materials such as feathers. They are built in holes in tree cavities, earth banks, rocky slopes, and within man-made structures or the nests of birds of prey
. Two clutches
of five or six eggs are typically laid in a season. Both parents construct the nest and care for their eggs and young.
length of 1.95 inches (5 cm). Its bill is 1 – long, pale grey on the juvenile, pale yellowish with a black tip on the breeding female, and black on the breeding male. Like all other sparrows, it flies swiftly and often at height.
Distinctive markings, especially on its head, make the Saxaul Sparrow unlikely to be confused with any other bird. It is dull-coloured, with plumage ranging between dull grey and warm sandy brown, varying between and within subspecies. Birds of the subspecies ammodendri are a sandy grey, while nigricans birds are similar but darker, and stoliczkae birds are warm brown or russet
. Birds of the subspecies stoliczkae and those from the southwest of the range of ammodendri also differ from usual ammodendri birds in their lack of streaking on the rump
and upper tail coverts
. Birds in Mongolia have a larger and deeper bill and broad bluish streaks on their chest.
The male Saxaul Sparrow has bold markings, with a black stripe along the top of its head and another through its eye. It has black feathering, or a "bib", on its throat and upper belly. By comparison to other sparrows this is thin on the throat, but wide on the breast. The male has a bright russet patch on the sides of its crown
and nape. Its cheeks are pale grey or buff
, and its underparts are whitish, tinged buff or grey on its sides. Its back is grey or warm brown, streaked variably with black. Its shoulders are more lightly streaked with black bars. The male's thin tail is brown, with the edges and tips of feathers paler. Its median coverts are black with a white tip, while its other wing feathers are variably dark brown, cinnamon, or black, tipped buff or whitish and edged grey. The non-breeding male differs in having slightly paler plumage.
The female is similar in some ways to the male, but paler and duller. It is sandy grey or brown, with a back patterned like that of the male, and white or whitish underparts. The head of the females of the subspecies ammodendri and nigricans is dingy grey with darker smudges on the forehead, behind its eyes, and on its throat. The female of the subspecies stoliczkae is buff-brown with a white throat, a conspicuous pale supercilium
, darker forehead, and lighter cheeks. The juvenile is similar to the female, differing in its lack of dark tinges on its throat and crown. In adults, moulting begins in July and ends in late August or early September. The post-juvenile moult is complete, and occurs variously from June to August.
The Saxaul Sparrow's vocalisations are little reported. Its common call is a chirp, transcribed as cheerp cheerp, softer and more melodious than that of the House Sparrow
. It gives a flight call transcribed as twerp, and a song described by Russian naturalist V. N. Shnitnikov as "not loud, but pleasantly melodious with fairly diversified intonations".
in his 1872 The Birds of Asia from a specimen collected near Kyzylorda, now in southern Kazakhstan
, by Russian naturalist Nikolai Severtzov. Severtzov had been planning to describe the species as Passer ammodendri for several years and had been distributing specimens among other naturalists. When natural history dealer Charles Dode escaped from the Paris Commune
in 1871 with some of his collection, Gould obtained a specimen from a set of rare birds Dode exhibited to the Zoological Society of London
and rushed a description of the species to print. Severtzov described the species in 1873, and some later writers preferred to attribute him, but Gould's description takes priority
over Severtzov's. The Saxaul Sparrow's species name refers to its desert habitat, coming from the name of the Ammodendron
or sand acacia tree, which is in turn derived from the Ancient Greek
άμμος (ammos, "sand") and δένδρον (dendron, "tree"). The English name Saxaul Sparrow refers to the saxaul plant, with which it is closely associated. The Saxaul Sparrow usually is classified in the genus
Passer
with the House Sparrow and around twenty other species, although a genus Ammopasser was created for the Saxaul Sparrow by Nikolai Zarudny
in 1890.
The Saxaul Sparrow's relations within the genus Passer are unclear, although with its black throat feathering it has usually been considered part of the "Palaearctic black-bibbed sparrow" group related to the House Sparrow. J. Denis Summers-Smith
considered that the Palaearctic Passer sparrows evolved about 25,000 to 15,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. During this time, sparrows would have been isolated in ice-free refugia, such as a certain steppe region in Central Asia, where Summers-Smith suggested the Saxaul Sparrow evolved. Genetic and fossil evidence suggest a much earlier origin for the Passer species, perhaps in the Miocene
and Pliocene
, as suggested by Luis Allende and colleagues in their 2001 phylogenetic
analysis of mitochondrial DNA
. This analysis also suggested that the Saxaul Sparrow may be an early offshoot or basal
species in its genus, a relative of certain African sparrows such as the Northern Grey-headed Sparrow. If the Saxaul Sparrow is related to these species, either the Saxaul Sparrow formerly occurred in the deserts of Africa and Arabia, or each of the groups of Passer sparrows are of African origin.
Across its Central Asian distribution, the Saxaul Sparrow occurs in six probably disjunct
areas, and is divided into at least three subspecies. The nominate subspecies Passer ammodendri ammodendri inhabits three of these areas, one in the Syr Darya
basin of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan
, and another to the south of Lake Balkhash
and the north of Almaty
, where it is only common in the valley of the Ili River
. In a third area, sometimes recognised as a subspecies korejewi, ammodendri birds breed sporadically in parts of central Turkmenistan
, Iran
, and possibly Afghanistan
, migrating to the south during the winter. The subspecies stoliczkae was named after Ferdinand Stoliczka
in 1874 by Allan Octavian Hume
, from specimens Stoliczka collected in Yarkand. This subspecies is separated from the other two subspecies by the Tian Shan
mountains. It is found across a broad swath of China from Kashgar east to the far west of Inner Mongolia
, through the areas around the Taklamakan Desert (but probably not in the inhospitable desert itself), and through the east of Xinjiang
, northern Gansu
, and the fringes of southern Mongolia
. In the extreme west of the Gobi Desert
a disjunct population separated from the other stoliczkae birds by the Gurvan Saikhan Uul mountains occurs, which is sometimes separated as a subspecies timidus. The subspecies nigricans, described by ornithologist L. S. Stepanyan
in 1961, is found in northern Xinjiang's Manasi River
valley.
, where its distribution is believed to fall into six disjunct areas, although this is uncertain due to the scarcity of records. It is found in deserts, especially around rivers and oases. It is usually found around shrubs such as saxaul (Haloxylon
), poplar (Populus), or tamarisk (Tamarix
). Sometimes it occurs around settlements and grain fields, especially during the winter. It is not believed to be threatened, since it is reported as locally common across a wide range, and hence it is assessed as Least Concern
on the IUCN Red List
. However, it seems to have lost large parts of its range to the intensification of agriculture and desertification
caused by overgrazing.
, and House Sparrows. In some regions, it makes small local migrations
. Towards the spring, Saxaul Sparrows form pairs within their flock, before dispersing in April. Seeds, especially those of the saxaul, are most of its diet, though it also eats insects, especially while breeding, most commonly weevil
s, grasshopper
s, and caterpillar
s. It forages in trees and on the ground. In a study of insects fed to nestlings in the Ili River
valley, it was found that beetles are predominant, with weevils and Coccinellidae
comprising 60 and 30 percent of the diet of nestlings, respectively. Because of its desert habitat and scarcity, it is not a pest of agriculture. Where water is not available, the Saxaul Sparrow may fly several times each day over long distances to drink.
The Saxaul Sparrow is less social than other sparrows while breeding, due to its dry habitat and its choices of nesting locations, holes in trees and earth banks. Isolated pairs are usual, though it sometimes breeds in small groups, with members of its own species as well as House and Eurasian Tree Sparrows. The breeding season
is short, lasting from May to July, with most young raised in April and June. Unusually for a sparrow, it has not been recorded nesting openly in branches, though this may simply represent the lack of published records. Nests are often built in tree cavities, where they are sometimes placed close together. Other common nesting localities are earth banks and rocky slopes, and nests have been recorded on the nests of birds of prey
, unused buildings, walls, and electricity pylons. Nests in man-made structures are increasingly common, as large trees in the Saxaul Sparrow's habitat are removed. Nests may be quite close to the ground, especially when they are built in trees.
The Saxaul Sparrow's nests are untidy dome-shaped constructions, with an entrance in the side or top. They are built of grass
es, root
s, and other plant materials, and are lined with feathers, fur, and soft plant material. The nest is mainly built by the female, though the male may actively take part in building. Typical clutches
have five or six eggs, and two clutches a year are normal. Eggs are broad and ovular, slightly pointed at an end. They are glossy, coloured white and shaded with rusty grey or yellowish brown. In some clutches, one egg is noticeably paler than the others. Four eggs collected by Zarudny from Transcaspia
had an average size of 1.9 × 1.4 cm (0.75 × 0.57 in). Females play the main part in incubating eggs, and males can often be seen guarding the nests during incubation. Males and females share in feeding their young, which they do every 4 to 12 minutes. Young that have left their nest remain nearby until well after their moult, before departing for winter flocks, followed later by the adults.
Passerine
A passerine is a bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds or, less accurately, as songbirds, the passerines form one of the most diverse terrestrial vertebrate orders: with over 5,000 identified species, it has roughly...
bird of the sparrow
Sparrow
The sparrows are a family of small passerine birds, Passeridae. They are also known as true sparrows, or Old World sparrows, names also used for a genus of the family, Passer...
family
Family (biology)
In biological classification, family is* a taxonomic rank. Other well-known ranks are life, domain, kingdom, phylum, class, order, genus, and species, with family fitting between order and genus. As for the other well-known ranks, there is the option of an immediately lower rank, indicated by the...
Passeridae, found in parts of Central Asia
Central Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
. At 14 – and 25 –, it is among the larger sparrows. Both sexes have plumage
Plumage
Plumage refers both to the layer of feathers that cover a bird and the pattern, colour, and arrangement of those feathers. The pattern and colours of plumage vary between species and subspecies and can also vary between different age classes, sexes, and season. Within species there can also be a...
ranging from dull grey to sandy brown, and pale brown legs. Females have less boldly coloured plumage and bills, lacking the pattern of black stripes on the male's head. The head markings of both sexes make the Saxaul Sparrow distinctive, and unlikely to be confused with any other bird. Vocalisations include a comparatively soft and musical chirping call, a song, and a flight call known.
Three subspecies
Subspecies
Subspecies in biological classification, is either a taxonomic rank subordinate to species, ora taxonomic unit in that rank . A subspecies cannot be recognized in isolation: a species will either be recognized as having no subspecies at all or two or more, never just one...
are recognised, differing in the overall tone of their plumage and in the head striping of the female. The subspecies ammodendri occurs in the west of the Saxaul Sparrow's range, while stoliczkae and nigricans occur in the east. This distribution falls into six probably disjunct areas across Central Asia, from central Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...
to northern Gansu
Gansu
' is a province located in the northwest of the People's Republic of China.It lies between the Tibetan and Huangtu plateaus, and borders Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and Ningxia to the north, Xinjiang and Qinghai to the west, Sichuan to the south, and Shaanxi to the east...
in China. A bird of deserts, the Saxaul Sparrow favours areas with shrubs such as the saxaul
Haloxylon
Haloxylon is a genus of shrubs or small trees, belonging to the plant family Amaranthaceae. Haloxylon and its species are known by the common name saxaul.-Description:...
, near rivers and oases. Though it has lost parts of its range to habitat destruction
Habitat destruction
Habitat destruction is the process in which natural habitat is rendered functionally unable to support the species present. In this process, the organisms that previously used the site are displaced or destroyed, reducing biodiversity. Habitat destruction by human activity mainly for the purpose of...
caused by agriculture, it is not seriously threatened by human activities.
Little is known of the Saxaul Sparrow's behaviour. Often hidden in foliage, it forages in trees and on the ground. It feeds mostly on seeds, as well as insects while breeding and as a nestling. When not breeding it forms wandering flocks, but it is less social than other sparrows while breeding, often nesting in isolated pairs. Nests are round bundles of dry plant material lined with soft materials such as feathers. They are built in holes in tree cavities, earth banks, rocky slopes, and within man-made structures or the nests of birds of prey
Bird of prey
Birds of prey are birds that hunt for food primarily on the wing, using their keen senses, especially vision. They are defined as birds that primarily hunt vertebrates, including other birds. Their talons and beaks tend to be relatively large, powerful and adapted for tearing and/or piercing flesh....
. Two clutches
Clutch (eggs)
A clutch of eggs refers to all the eggs produced by birds or reptiles, often at a single time, particularly those laid in a nest.In birds, destruction of a clutch by predators, , results in double-clutching...
of five or six eggs are typically laid in a season. Both parents construct the nest and care for their eggs and young.
Description
The Saxaul Sparrow is one of the larger sparrows at 14 – and 25 –. Wing length varies from 7.1 to 8.1 cm (2.8 to 3.2 in), with males generally being larger. The tail is short at 6.3 –. The Saxaul Sparrow's legs are pale or pinkish brown, with a tarsusTarsus (skeleton)
In tetrapods, the tarsus is a cluster of articulating bones in each foot situated between the lower end of tibia and fibula of the lower leg and the metatarsus. In the foot the tarsus articulates with the bones of the metatarsus, which in turn articulate with the bones of the individual toes...
length of 1.95 inches (5 cm). Its bill is 1 – long, pale grey on the juvenile, pale yellowish with a black tip on the breeding female, and black on the breeding male. Like all other sparrows, it flies swiftly and often at height.
Distinctive markings, especially on its head, make the Saxaul Sparrow unlikely to be confused with any other bird. It is dull-coloured, with plumage ranging between dull grey and warm sandy brown, varying between and within subspecies. Birds of the subspecies ammodendri are a sandy grey, while nigricans birds are similar but darker, and stoliczkae birds are warm brown or russet
Russet (color)
Russet is a dark brown color with a reddish-orange tinge.The first recorded use of russet as a color name in English was in 1562.The source of this color is the ISCC-NBS Dictionary of Color Names --Color dictionary used by stamp collectors to identify the colors of stampsThe name of the color...
. Birds of the subspecies stoliczkae and those from the southwest of the range of ammodendri also differ from usual ammodendri birds in their lack of streaking on the rump
Rump (animal)
The rump or croup, in the external morphology of an animal, is the portion of the posterior dorsum that is posterior to the loins and anterior to the tail. Anatomically, the rump corresponds to the sacrum....
and upper tail coverts
Covert (feather)
A covert feather on a bird is one of a set of feathers, called coverts, which as the name implies, cover other feathers. The coverts help to smooth airflow over the wings and tail.- Wing-coverts :...
. Birds in Mongolia have a larger and deeper bill and broad bluish streaks on their chest.
The male Saxaul Sparrow has bold markings, with a black stripe along the top of its head and another through its eye. It has black feathering, or a "bib", on its throat and upper belly. By comparison to other sparrows this is thin on the throat, but wide on the breast. The male has a bright russet patch on the sides of its crown
Crown (anatomy)
A crown is the top of the head.The following birds and other animals are said to have a crown on their head:* Cranes** Grey-crowned Crane** Red-crowned Crane** Black-crowned Crane* Crowned eagle* Gray-crowned Rosy Finch* Yellow-crowned Gonolek...
and nape. Its cheeks are pale grey or buff
Buff (colour)
Buff is a pale yellow-brown colour that got its name from the colour of buff leather.Displayed on the right is the colour buff.EtymologyAccording to the Oxford English Dictionary, buff as a descriptor of a colour was first used in the London Gazette of 1686, describing a uniform to be "A Red Coat...
, and its underparts are whitish, tinged buff or grey on its sides. Its back is grey or warm brown, streaked variably with black. Its shoulders are more lightly streaked with black bars. The male's thin tail is brown, with the edges and tips of feathers paler. Its median coverts are black with a white tip, while its other wing feathers are variably dark brown, cinnamon, or black, tipped buff or whitish and edged grey. The non-breeding male differs in having slightly paler plumage.
The female is similar in some ways to the male, but paler and duller. It is sandy grey or brown, with a back patterned like that of the male, and white or whitish underparts. The head of the females of the subspecies ammodendri and nigricans is dingy grey with darker smudges on the forehead, behind its eyes, and on its throat. The female of the subspecies stoliczkae is buff-brown with a white throat, a conspicuous pale supercilium
Supercilium
The supercilium is a plumage feature found on the heads of some bird species. It is a stripe which runs from the base of the bird's beak above its eye, finishing somewhere towards the rear of the bird's head. Also known as an "eyebrow", it is distinct from the eyestripe, which is a line which runs...
, darker forehead, and lighter cheeks. The juvenile is similar to the female, differing in its lack of dark tinges on its throat and crown. In adults, moulting begins in July and ends in late August or early September. The post-juvenile moult is complete, and occurs variously from June to August.
The Saxaul Sparrow's vocalisations are little reported. Its common call is a chirp, transcribed as cheerp cheerp, softer and more melodious than that of the House Sparrow
House Sparrow
The House Sparrow is a bird of the sparrow family Passeridae, found in most parts of the world. One of about 25 species in the genus Passer, the House Sparrow occurs naturally in most of Europe, the Mediterranean region, and much of Asia...
. It gives a flight call transcribed as twerp, and a song described by Russian naturalist V. N. Shnitnikov as "not loud, but pleasantly melodious with fairly diversified intonations".
Taxonomy
The Saxaul Sparrow was first described by English zoologist John GouldJohn Gould
John Gould was an English ornithologist and bird artist. The Gould League in Australia was named after him. His identification of the birds now nicknamed "Darwin's finches" played a role in the inception of Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection...
in his 1872 The Birds of Asia from a specimen collected near Kyzylorda, now in southern Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan
Kazakhstan , officially the Republic of Kazakhstan, is a transcontinental country in Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Ranked as the ninth largest country in the world, it is also the world's largest landlocked country; its territory of is greater than Western Europe...
, by Russian naturalist Nikolai Severtzov. Severtzov had been planning to describe the species as Passer ammodendri for several years and had been distributing specimens among other naturalists. When natural history dealer Charles Dode escaped from the Paris Commune
Paris Commune
The Paris Commune was a government that briefly ruled Paris from March 18 to May 28, 1871. It existed before the split between anarchists and Marxists had taken place, and it is hailed by both groups as the first assumption of power by the working class during the Industrial Revolution...
in 1871 with some of his collection, Gould obtained a specimen from a set of rare birds Dode exhibited to the Zoological Society of London
Zoological Society of London
The Zoological Society of London is a charity devoted to the worldwide conservation of animals and their habitats...
and rushed a description of the species to print. Severtzov described the species in 1873, and some later writers preferred to attribute him, but Gould's description takes priority
Principle of Priority
thumb|270px|Boa manditraIn zoology, the scientific study of animals, the Principle of Priority is one of the guiding principles of the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, defined by Article 23....
over Severtzov's. The Saxaul Sparrow's species name refers to its desert habitat, coming from the name of the Ammodendron
Ammodendron
Ammodendron is a genus of flowering plants, called the sand acacias, in the legume family, Fabaceae. It belongs to the subfamily Faboideae. Its name is derived from the Greek άμμος ammos and δένδρον dendron ....
or sand acacia tree, which is in turn derived from the Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek
Ancient Greek is the stage of the Greek language in the periods spanning the times c. 9th–6th centuries BC, , c. 5th–4th centuries BC , and the c. 3rd century BC – 6th century AD of ancient Greece and the ancient world; being predated in the 2nd millennium BC by Mycenaean Greek...
άμμος (ammos, "sand") and δένδρον (dendron, "tree"). The English name Saxaul Sparrow refers to the saxaul plant, with which it is closely associated. The Saxaul Sparrow usually is classified in the genus
Genus
In biology, a genus is a low-level taxonomic rank used in the biological classification of living and fossil organisms, which is an example of definition by genus and differentia...
Passer
Passer
Passer is a genus of Old World sparrows. These sparrows are plump little brown or greyish birds often with black, yellow or white markings. Typically 10–20 cm long, they have short tails and stubby conical beaks...
with the House Sparrow and around twenty other species, although a genus Ammopasser was created for the Saxaul Sparrow by Nikolai Zarudny
Nikolai Zarudny
Nikolai Alekseyvich Zarudny was a Ukrainian-Russian explorer and zoologist of Ukrainian origin, who studied the fauna, especially the birds of Central Asia. He was born in Gryakovo, Ukraine . He wrote his first ornithology book in 1896 and made five expeditions in the Caspian region from 1884 and...
in 1890.
The Saxaul Sparrow's relations within the genus Passer are unclear, although with its black throat feathering it has usually been considered part of the "Palaearctic black-bibbed sparrow" group related to the House Sparrow. J. Denis Summers-Smith
J. Denis Summers-Smith
James Denis Summers-Smith is a British ornithologist and mechanical engineer, a specialist both in sparrows and industrial tribology....
considered that the Palaearctic Passer sparrows evolved about 25,000 to 15,000 years ago, during the last glacial period. During this time, sparrows would have been isolated in ice-free refugia, such as a certain steppe region in Central Asia, where Summers-Smith suggested the Saxaul Sparrow evolved. Genetic and fossil evidence suggest a much earlier origin for the Passer species, perhaps in the Miocene
Miocene
The Miocene is a geological epoch of the Neogene Period and extends from about . The Miocene was named by Sir Charles Lyell. Its name comes from the Greek words and and means "less recent" because it has 18% fewer modern sea invertebrates than the Pliocene. The Miocene follows the Oligocene...
and Pliocene
Pliocene
The Pliocene Epoch is the period in the geologic timescale that extends from 5.332 million to 2.588 million years before present. It is the second and youngest epoch of the Neogene Period in the Cenozoic Era. The Pliocene follows the Miocene Epoch and is followed by the Pleistocene Epoch...
, as suggested by Luis Allende and colleagues in their 2001 phylogenetic
Phylogenetics
In biology, phylogenetics is the study of evolutionary relatedness among groups of organisms , which is discovered through molecular sequencing data and morphological data matrices...
analysis of mitochondrial DNA
Mitochondrial DNA
Mitochondrial DNA is the DNA located in organelles called mitochondria, structures within eukaryotic cells that convert the chemical energy from food into a form that cells can use, adenosine triphosphate...
. This analysis also suggested that the Saxaul Sparrow may be an early offshoot or basal
Basal (phylogenetics)
In phylogenetics, a basal clade is the earliest clade to branch in a larger clade; it appears at the base of a cladogram.A basal group forms an outgroup to the rest of the clade, such as in the following example:...
species in its genus, a relative of certain African sparrows such as the Northern Grey-headed Sparrow. If the Saxaul Sparrow is related to these species, either the Saxaul Sparrow formerly occurred in the deserts of Africa and Arabia, or each of the groups of Passer sparrows are of African origin.
Across its Central Asian distribution, the Saxaul Sparrow occurs in six probably disjunct
Disjunct distribution
In biology, a taxon with a disjunct distribution is one that has two or more groups that are related but widely separated from each other geographically...
areas, and is divided into at least three subspecies. The nominate subspecies Passer ammodendri ammodendri inhabits three of these areas, one in the Syr Darya
Syr Darya
The Syr Darya , also transliterated Syrdarya or Sirdaryo, is a river in Central Asia, sometimes known as the Jaxartes or Yaxartes from its Ancient Greek name . The Greek name is derived from Old Persian, Yakhsha Arta , a reference to the color of the river's water...
basin of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan
Uzbekistan , officially the Republic of Uzbekistan is a doubly landlocked country in Central Asia and one of the six independent Turkic states. It shares borders with Kazakhstan to the west and to the north, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to the east, and Afghanistan and Turkmenistan to the south....
, and another to the south of Lake Balkhash
Lake Balkhash
Lake Balkhash is one of the largest lakes in Asia and 12th largest continental lake in the world. It is located in southeastern Kazakhstan, in Central Asia, and belongs to an endorheic basin shared by Kazakhstan and China, with a small part in Kyrgyzstan. The basin drains into the lake via seven...
and the north of Almaty
Almaty
Almaty , also known by its former names Verny and Alma-Ata , is the former capital of Kazakhstan and the nation's largest city, with a population of 1,348,500...
, where it is only common in the valley of the Ili River
Ili River
thumb|right|300px|Map of the Lake Balkhash drainage basin showing the Ili River and its tributariesThe Ili River is a river in northwestern China and southeastern Kazakhstan .It is long, of which is in Kazakhstan...
. In a third area, sometimes recognised as a subspecies korejewi, ammodendri birds breed sporadically in parts of central Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan
Turkmenistan , formerly also known as Turkmenia is one of the Turkic states in Central Asia. Until 1991, it was a constituent republic of the Soviet Union, the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic . Turkmenistan is one of the six independent Turkic states...
, Iran
Iran
Iran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
, and possibly Afghanistan
Afghanistan
Afghanistan , officially the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, is a landlocked country located in the centre of Asia, forming South Asia, Central Asia and the Middle East. With a population of about 29 million, it has an area of , making it the 42nd most populous and 41st largest nation in the world...
, migrating to the south during the winter. The subspecies stoliczkae was named after Ferdinand Stoliczka
Ferdinand Stoliczka
Ferdinand Stoliczka was a Moravian palaeontologist who worked in India on paleontology, geology and various aspects of zoology. He died of high altitude sickness during an expedition across the Himalayas.-Early life:Stoliczka was born at the lodge Zámeček near Kroměříž in Moravia...
in 1874 by Allan Octavian Hume
Allan Octavian Hume
Allan Octavian Hume was a civil servant, political reformer and amateur ornithologist in British India. He was one of the founders of the Indian National Congress, a political party that was later to lead the Indian independence movement...
, from specimens Stoliczka collected in Yarkand. This subspecies is separated from the other two subspecies by the Tian Shan
Tian Shan
The Tian Shan , also spelled Tien Shan, is a large mountain system located in Central Asia. The highest peak in the Tian Shan is Victory Peak , ....
mountains. It is found across a broad swath of China from Kashgar east to the far west of Inner Mongolia
Inner Mongolia
Inner Mongolia is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China, located in the northern region of the country. Inner Mongolia shares an international border with the countries of Mongolia and the Russian Federation...
, through the areas around the Taklamakan Desert (but probably not in the inhospitable desert itself), and through the east of Xinjiang
Xinjiang
Xinjiang is an autonomous region of the People's Republic of China. It is the largest Chinese administrative division and spans over 1.6 million km2...
, northern Gansu
Gansu
' is a province located in the northwest of the People's Republic of China.It lies between the Tibetan and Huangtu plateaus, and borders Mongolia, Inner Mongolia, and Ningxia to the north, Xinjiang and Qinghai to the west, Sichuan to the south, and Shaanxi to the east...
, and the fringes of southern Mongolia
Mongolia
Mongolia is a landlocked country in East and Central Asia. It is bordered by Russia to the north and China to the south, east and west. Although Mongolia does not share a border with Kazakhstan, its western-most point is only from Kazakhstan's eastern tip. Ulan Bator, the capital and largest...
. In the extreme west of the Gobi Desert
Gobi Desert
The Gobi is a large desert region in Asia. It covers parts of northern and northwestern China, and of southern Mongolia. The desert basins of the Gobi are bounded by the Altai Mountains and the grasslands and steppes of Mongolia on the north, by the Hexi Corridor and Tibetan Plateau to the...
a disjunct population separated from the other stoliczkae birds by the Gurvan Saikhan Uul mountains occurs, which is sometimes separated as a subspecies timidus. The subspecies nigricans, described by ornithologist L. S. Stepanyan
L. S. Stepanyan
Leo Surenovich Stepanyan was an Armenian ornithologist, best known as the author of the Conspectus of the ornithological fauna of the USSR, a taxonomic work in Russian on birds of the Soviet Union....
in 1961, is found in northern Xinjiang's Manasi River
Manasi River
The Manasi River is in the south of Dzungarian Basin, Xinjiang, China. Flowing into Lake Manasi, the river is about 450 km long....
valley.
Habitat
The Saxaul Sparrow is found in remote parts of Central AsiaCentral Asia
Central Asia is a core region of the Asian continent from the Caspian Sea in the west, China in the east, Afghanistan in the south, and Russia in the north...
, where its distribution is believed to fall into six disjunct areas, although this is uncertain due to the scarcity of records. It is found in deserts, especially around rivers and oases. It is usually found around shrubs such as saxaul (Haloxylon
Haloxylon
Haloxylon is a genus of shrubs or small trees, belonging to the plant family Amaranthaceae. Haloxylon and its species are known by the common name saxaul.-Description:...
), poplar (Populus), or tamarisk (Tamarix
Tamarix
The genus Tamarix is composed of about 50-60 species of flowering plants in the family Tamaricaceae, native to drier areas of Eurasia and Africa...
). Sometimes it occurs around settlements and grain fields, especially during the winter. It is not believed to be threatened, since it is reported as locally common across a wide range, and hence it is assessed as Least Concern
Least Concern
Least Concern is an IUCN category assigned to extant taxon or lower taxa which have been evaluated but do not qualify for any other category. As such they do not qualify as threatened, Near Threatened, or Conservation Dependent...
on the IUCN Red List
IUCN Red List
The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species , founded in 1963, is the world's most comprehensive inventory of the global conservation status of biological species. The International Union for Conservation of Nature is the world's main authority on the conservation status of species...
. However, it seems to have lost large parts of its range to the intensification of agriculture and desertification
Desertification
Desertification is the degradation of land in drylands. Caused by a variety of factors, such as climate change and human activities, desertification is one of the most significant global environmental problems.-Definitions:...
caused by overgrazing.
Behaviour
Little is known of the Saxaul Sparrow's behaviour, because of its remote range. It is shy in many areas, and spends much time hidden in foliage, but breeding birds in Mongolia were reported to be "quite confiding". When not breeding, it is social, and can form flocks of up to fifty birds, sometimes associating with Eurasian Tree, SpanishSpanish Sparrow
The Spanish Sparrow or Willow Sparrow is a passerine bird of the sparrow family Passeridae. It is found in the Mediterranean region and southwest and central Asia...
, and House Sparrows. In some regions, it makes small local migrations
Bird migration
Bird migration is the regular seasonal journey undertaken by many species of birds. Bird movements include those made in response to changes in food availability, habitat or weather. Sometimes, journeys are not termed "true migration" because they are irregular or in only one direction...
. Towards the spring, Saxaul Sparrows form pairs within their flock, before dispersing in April. Seeds, especially those of the saxaul, are most of its diet, though it also eats insects, especially while breeding, most commonly weevil
Weevil
A weevil is any beetle from the Curculionoidea superfamily. They are usually small, less than , and herbivorous. There are over 60,000 species in several families, mostly in the family Curculionidae...
s, grasshopper
Grasshopper
The grasshopper is an insect of the suborder Caelifera in the order Orthoptera. To distinguish it from bush crickets or katydids, it is sometimes referred to as the short-horned grasshopper...
s, and caterpillar
Caterpillar
Caterpillars are the larval form of members of the order Lepidoptera . They are mostly herbivorous in food habit, although some species are insectivorous. Caterpillars are voracious feeders and many of them are considered to be pests in agriculture...
s. It forages in trees and on the ground. In a study of insects fed to nestlings in the Ili River
Ili River
thumb|right|300px|Map of the Lake Balkhash drainage basin showing the Ili River and its tributariesThe Ili River is a river in northwestern China and southeastern Kazakhstan .It is long, of which is in Kazakhstan...
valley, it was found that beetles are predominant, with weevils and Coccinellidae
Coccinellidae
Coccinellidae is a family of beetles, known variously as ladybirds , or ladybugs . Scientists increasingly prefer the names ladybird beetles or lady beetles as these insects are not true bugs...
comprising 60 and 30 percent of the diet of nestlings, respectively. Because of its desert habitat and scarcity, it is not a pest of agriculture. Where water is not available, the Saxaul Sparrow may fly several times each day over long distances to drink.
The Saxaul Sparrow is less social than other sparrows while breeding, due to its dry habitat and its choices of nesting locations, holes in trees and earth banks. Isolated pairs are usual, though it sometimes breeds in small groups, with members of its own species as well as House and Eurasian Tree Sparrows. The breeding season
Breeding season
The breeding season is the most suitable season, usually with favourable conditions and abundant food and water, for breeding among some wild animals and birds . Species with a breeding season have naturally evolved to have sexual intercourse during a certain time of year in order to achieve the...
is short, lasting from May to July, with most young raised in April and June. Unusually for a sparrow, it has not been recorded nesting openly in branches, though this may simply represent the lack of published records. Nests are often built in tree cavities, where they are sometimes placed close together. Other common nesting localities are earth banks and rocky slopes, and nests have been recorded on the nests of birds of prey
Bird of prey
Birds of prey are birds that hunt for food primarily on the wing, using their keen senses, especially vision. They are defined as birds that primarily hunt vertebrates, including other birds. Their talons and beaks tend to be relatively large, powerful and adapted for tearing and/or piercing flesh....
, unused buildings, walls, and electricity pylons. Nests in man-made structures are increasingly common, as large trees in the Saxaul Sparrow's habitat are removed. Nests may be quite close to the ground, especially when they are built in trees.
The Saxaul Sparrow's nests are untidy dome-shaped constructions, with an entrance in the side or top. They are built of grass
Grass
Grasses, or more technically graminoids, are monocotyledonous, usually herbaceous plants with narrow leaves growing from the base. They include the "true grasses", of the Poaceae family, as well as the sedges and the rushes . The true grasses include cereals, bamboo and the grasses of lawns ...
es, root
Root
In vascular plants, the root is the organ of a plant that typically lies below the surface of the soil. This is not always the case, however, since a root can also be aerial or aerating . Furthermore, a stem normally occurring below ground is not exceptional either...
s, and other plant materials, and are lined with feathers, fur, and soft plant material. The nest is mainly built by the female, though the male may actively take part in building. Typical clutches
Clutch (eggs)
A clutch of eggs refers to all the eggs produced by birds or reptiles, often at a single time, particularly those laid in a nest.In birds, destruction of a clutch by predators, , results in double-clutching...
have five or six eggs, and two clutches a year are normal. Eggs are broad and ovular, slightly pointed at an end. They are glossy, coloured white and shaded with rusty grey or yellowish brown. In some clutches, one egg is noticeably paler than the others. Four eggs collected by Zarudny from Transcaspia
Transcaspian Region
Transcaspian Region , or Transcaspia, was the name used from the second half of the 19th century until 1924 for the section of Russian Empire to the east of the Caspian Sea, bounded to the south by Iran's Khorasan Province and Afghanistan, to the north by the former Russian province of Uralsk, and...
had an average size of 1.9 × 1.4 cm (0.75 × 0.57 in). Females play the main part in incubating eggs, and males can often be seen guarding the nests during incubation. Males and females share in feeding their young, which they do every 4 to 12 minutes. Young that have left their nest remain nearby until well after their moult, before departing for winter flocks, followed later by the adults.
External links
- Saxaul Sparrow at the Internet Bird Collection
- Saxaul Sparrow at Birds of Kazakhstan
- Recording of the Saxaul Sparrow's song
- Saxaul Sparrow at Oriental Bird Images