The scaly breasted munia, or spice finch, or nutmeg mannikin fits the bill,
darker chestnut back, light belly and chest (the scales only show up on
adults and they are breeding well) and a dark face. They are the exotic
that shows up away from several parks most often and is more and more
becoming a feeder bird too. Some people have hordes of them and Wild Birds
Unlimited sells lots of millet to people feeding them.
They use treetops to call and when moving around. The bishops etc appear to
be more limited to specialized habitat but do use treetops when not
feeding. But they are larger birds, house sparrow size and the munia are
very small.
On Fri, Aug 19, 2016 at 1:58 PM, Robert Hardway <rhardway21@xxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
While in Houston this past week I had two small finch-like birds land in a
tree outside of my hotel. They had reddish upperparts and what looked like
a darker mask around the eyes and bill. The breast and underparts were
light however. These birds were smaller than the Lesser Goldfinches I see
here in Central Texas, and were definitely NOT House Finches. Being
unprepared (no binos with me as I was returning from client visits) I
didn't get a great look before they flew off. Can anyone with more
experience with exotics from the area shed any light?
Thanks a ton!
Rob Hardway
Lago Vista, TX
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