The Sierra Madre sparrow, Xenospiza baileyi, Gorrion Serrano in Spanish, is the only species of the genus Xenospiza and is endemic to Mexico. Because of the loss of its habitat, it can only be found today in two locations in the country: one in the State of Mexico; and the other in the State of Durango. This is a small bird of just five centimetres or less. Most of its feathers are in dark brown tones with creamy-white sort of eyebrows and a white-gray-black streaked breast with a very distinctive black central spot.
The mountain valleys of the Sierra Madre Occidental, populated with bunchgrass Muhlenbergia macroura, M. Affinis, were where the Sierra Madre sparrow lived and made its nests. Due to the loss of this particular grass caused by agriculture, i.e. the conversion of valleys to farm land by mountain inhabitants and the burning of bunchgrass in the dry season, the sparrows are in bad trouble.