I had a Junco at my feeders that intrigued me. It had an obvious hood. But at the time it felt really grayish. So I went down a rabbit hole of looking at Cassiar Junco, which until today I didn't even really realize was a thing and probably just labeled any junco with a hood an Oregon, but am still fairly confused about it.
I took photos of the bird so I'm attaching one. In the photos, it seems more warm than my perception of it when I was looking at it, but maybe that was just the lighting that made me think it was grayer. But even in the pics you can note some grayish in the breast and a touch in the flank.
Since it's winter and this can be useful to everyone, any Junco aficionados want to enlighten us? Looking at ebird, there seems to be less reporting overall of Junco hyemalis cismontanus. So I wonder if more people are like me and less aware of the Junco subspecies. I know I I generally don't bother with subspecies of most birds and am fine with just knowing the species. Oregon Junco was like the only one I usually noted. And it turns out I may have been doing it wrong. Birds. Amirite?
