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Let your mind’s eye sweep over the rich expanse of the avian family tree. Revel in its deep, gnarly divisions, its long, slender shoots. You’ll come to a profusion of branches and twigs — the songbirds, or passerines — and if you look closer still, a colorful cloud of myriad forms, the nine-primaried cardinals, tanagers, [...]

Like many birds in these days of rampant development, overconsumption, population growth, and global warming, the Cerulean Warbler faces a host of threats to its survival as a species.  BirdLife International lists the Cerulean Warbler as Vulnerable because of “a large and statistically significant decrease over the last 40 years in North America” that is equivalent to [...]

The Audubon’s Warbler (Dendroica coronata auduboni) is the western edition of the Yellow-rumped Warbler (Dendroica coronata).  The Myrtle Warbler (Dendroica coronata coronata), the eastern subspecies, and Audubon’s Warblers hybridize in the southern Canadian Rockies and on the basis of this evidence, as well as genetic similarities, these two species were combined into a single species in 1973 by [...]

This week’s quiz was the most diabolical quiz I have written and it was answered in no time at all.  Congratulations to Sarah T ! [I had a girlfriend named Sarah T. many years ago who was a birder.  Could it be?  No, it couldn’t be.] BAHAMA YELLOWTHROAT it is!  Sarah T – How did [...]

My first exposure to the beautiful birds known as wood-warblers was on a small group of islands on the edge of the world (almost). The Farallon Islands, twenty five miles off the coast of San Francisco, are perhaps best known not for birds, instead for the population of Great White Sharks which come to feed [...]

Pleased pleased pleased to meet ya! Pleased pleased pleased to meet ya! Pleased pleased pleased to meet ya! The Chestnut-sided Warbler is one friendly little bird, constantly exclaiming how excited he is to make your acquaintance.  And it is the cold-hearted birder who does not feel the same about the yellow-capped, black-masked, chestnut-sided bundle of [...]

1. As I have explained at length in my last 10,000 Birds blog post, wood warblers are nondescript little birds, formally known by the binomial Phylloscopus sibilatrix. Being an identity thief just does not win friends in honest birding circles. As soon as those smart scientist types see the error in their ways, they will [...]

Rightly or wrongly, there’s an hierarchy of extinct birds in North America, in the United States in particular.  Each offers a portrait of a nation at a crossroads, a series of Aesop’s Fables for a nascent environmental movement whose themes become more or less relevant in the public mindset depending on what issues need to [...]

Scope of Work This blog post investigates the nagging notion that warblers of the Old World are drab and boring interesting on multiple levels especially to the extreme bird enthusiast while North American wood-warblers are nothing but beautiful and magical. I have tried to go beyond the emotional perception and actually analyse the colours on [...]

North Americans are so enamored with wood warblers that we often forget that folks in most countries don’t get to see these exquisite insectivores. Even less forgivable is that we often forget that folks in many other countries in what is considered the New World actually DO get to see warblers, in some cases with great [...]

New York City offers the best wood-warbler watching of any city in the United States or Canada.  Sure, Chicago has a magic hedge, Boston has a cemetery, and other cities must, on occasion, attract some Parulidae, but none can even compare to the marvel that is migration in The Big Apple.  Attention is often and [...]

TECPAN, GUATEMALA FEBRUARY 2009 – Surprisingly for a country with over 720 bird species on its list, Guatemala doesn’t have any species to call its very own, unless you consider Goldman’s Warbler a full-fledged species. Endemic, however, may be in the eye of the beholder. The Endemic Bird Area (EBA) BirdLife International has designated North [...]

In honor of Wood Warbler Week here at 10,000 Birds, this quiz is about one specific warbler species.  I have chosen this species for today’s quiz because of an abundance of wonderful clues! Identify the species in question.  And here we go: – This species has a FACEBOOK PAGE!!!!!!  Really!  Exciting on one hand, and [...]

The Cape May Warbler is an outstanding bird and an outing that includes one is almost undoubtedly considered successful.  Good looks at one are rare both because Dendroica tigrina is not among the most common of wood-warblers and because most of their time is spent high up in the canopy during migration.  Add to that [...]

We declared May 8-14, 2011 Wood-Warbler Week on 10,000 Birds to celebrate the return of many of our favorite migrants to the temperate zones of North America. It may seem like cruel and unusual punishment for we denizens of the New World to spend an entire week celebrating what is surely the coolest family of [...]

Birders up north are no doubt gearing up for the peak of spring migration across the eastern half of the continent. The middle of May is the most exciting and anxiety inducing period of the birder’s year. The mad rush to reach the boreal forest just after the thaw leaves little time for dillying nor [...]

Kenn Kaufmann, David Sibley, Pete Dunne, Corey Finger and – it seems the rest of the American birding world have it all wrong. I was living in the hope that Richard Crossley would set it right with his brilliant new book, but alas even he decided to not shake the boat or upset the powers [...]

In spring, crows and ravens get jealous of all the attention that wood-warblers receive from birders.  Sometimes the jealousy overwhelms their big corvid brains and they come up with crazy schemes to win the attention that they believe they deserve.  For example, Fish Crows will actually swoop in and eat warblers you are trying to [...]

As much as I appreciate the juncos at my feeding station, I’m ready for spring.  I was going over some of my bird lists from 2010 to turn in on eBird (I know, I’m a slacker about turning those in) I found my ears practically salivating for a red-winged blackbird trill.  Then I realized, this [...]

Pretty much the last thing I expected to do today was see a first state record of a wood-warbler.  You see, tomorrow I am going to North Carolina for several days and had set aside today as a non-birding day (a strategy which, of late, hasn’t worked out too well).  Then we found out that [...]