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A tricky ID
- To: carolinabirds@duke.edu
- Subject: A tricky ID
- From: Michael Schultz <mschultz@duke.edu>
- Date: Sat, 18 Sep 1999 22:21:38 -0400
- Sender: carolinabirds-owner@acpub.duke.edu
Fall Warbler Fans:
Today, while birding with friends on the Chatham County NC migration day
count, Norm Budnitz and I came across a puzzling warbler, and I thought
many of our fellow birders, both beginning and experienced, might be
interested in the source that solved our puzzle. We were looking slightly
down into some Willows bordering Jordan Lake and saw the following field
marks during a brief but clear view of the bird: a clear gray head and
back with a distinct eye ring and a clear yellow throat and breast. The
head looked very much like a Nashville, but there are several other
eye-ringed yellow breasted fall warblers. However, our bird also had
distinct white wing-bars!! This ruled out Nashville, and Canada, and the
yellow underparts ruled out most of the rest. A new third edition Nat.
Geo. guide was available, but a look through the wing-barred warblers did
not find a match. Magnolia was close but the plate shows fall birds with
an eye line and ear patch. We remained stumped until I dug deeper into my
on board library at our next stop. A glance in Jon Dunn and Kimball
Garrett's Warblers did find a match, a first fall female Magnolia Warbler.
When I arrived home I looked through some other guides, and the only other
accurate portrayal I found of this plumage was on the fall warbler page in
the old Zimm/Singer Golden Guide.
I highly recomend Dunn and Garrett's thorough book to all warbler
watchers. There are as many as 12 different (for Orange-crowned) plummages
pictured, seven in the case of our Magnolia. It made our day a ten warbler
day, and we learned something too!!
Happy Warblering,
Mike Schultz
Durham, NC