Prevost's Ground Sparrow
Melozone biarcuata
Prevost's ground sparrow is on average 15 cm long and weighs 28 g. The adult has a stubby dark-grey bill, unstreaked olive-brown upperparts, a rufous crown and mainly white underparts. Young birds are browner above, have yellower underparts, and a duller indistinct head pattern. It has a simple head pattern in which the rufous of the crown extends down the sides of the neck as a half collar behind the white face. Voice: Calls include a thin tsit or a clearer psee. The male's song, given from a hidden perch in the wet season, is a whistled pst’t’t’t peer peer peer whee whee whee.
ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0
Rusty-crowned Ground Sparrow
Melozone kieneri
The rusty-crowned ground sparrow is 15 to 18 cm (5.9 to 7.1 in) long and weighs 35 to 41 g (1.2 to 1.4 oz). The sexes have the same plumage. Adults have a dusky black forecrown and a rufous crown; the rufous continues around behind the dusky black ear coverts and then forward under them. They have white lores and a broken white eye-ring. Their upperparts, wings, and tail are brown. Their underparts are mostly white with a black spot in the center of the breast, brown flanks, and rufescent undertail coverts. Voice: The rusty-crowned ground sparrow's song is a "very high simple calm unstructured tjitit-tjitit-tutututut". It also makes "a high, thin, slightly wiry lisping dzzzzzzzziu or ssssssziu, a high, thin ti, often doubled, and high, sharp chips, tk or tsik".
ID text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0
Where you might meet both
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Play today's Daily BirdPhotos and recordings are credited to their authors under the licence shown. Full profiles: Prevost's Ground Sparrow and Rusty-crowned Ground Sparrow.