House Finch (Argus)

I took a walk with my boyfriend this afternoon (June 17th) and got a sunburn.  I thought I'd be fine as it was past 2 p.m.  So much for those "prime tanning hours."  My neighborhood has plenty of lawns, shrubs, and mostly deciduous trees.  On our way home, we saw a bird perching on a telephone wire.  We listened to it call for a short time before my brain kicked in to take a picture:

We determined after some argument that it was a house finch.  Finches come in a variety of shades.  House finches, by distinction, come in shades of red and yellow depending on the amount of pigment present in the food they eat.  This guy (although tough to tell in the picture) had a bright red head but was more yellow on his chest.  Finches are small birds, somewhere between a sparrow and a robin.  House finches have brown and white speckled wings and bodies; the color is confined to their face and upper chest.  Their tail is square-shaped.  It was nice that we heard his song for so long; we were able to identify the bird by it!