David, so far as I know, all eastern sparrow type birds that could
possibly be confused with juncos are predominantly brown, but some might
appear grayish in poor light.  But, most also have some degree of
streaking and some degree of head patterning.  Could it be that the pink
bill appears yellow in the light you are observing with?  That sounds
most reasonable to me.  You mention no red, but rosy finches should not
be where you are, and house and purple finches are definitely quite
streaked.   Google Cornell Laboratory of Ornithology, and when you get
it, select the identification pages.  Of course, you likely have good
field guides, so the lab pages may not help much.  I'd say junco, and
the bill color is deceiving.  Especially since you say you are
colorblind, and pink is just dilute red.  On the Cornell pages, some
photos show the bill as appearing yellowish, anyway (though in hand all
are definitely pink).  BTW, you probably have a regional email list or
two devoted to birding -- our local one is OKbirds.org.  Try googling
for one for New England.

Davd

On Fri, Nov 20, 2009 at 10:43 AM, David Beierl wrote:

> Twice in the last month I've had a small junco-ish bird at my feeder
> in Rhode Island.  I thought it was the first of the winter junco
> crop, but it has an obviously yellow sparrow/finch type short
> straight un-crossed bill with overall smooth coloring
> darkish/gray-looking above and whitish below.  Can't tell you eyes
> except dark, head patterns except nothing striking, flight pattern
> etc.  If there's any red on it I'm colorblind enough that I wouldn't
> have seen it without binocs.  Both times sitting on a feeder perch in
> the company of my rowdy street-gang of sparrows/LBJs, not engaging in
> aggressive behavior that I saw.
>
> Any ideas?  I'm stumped.
>
> Yours,
> David