Townsend's Warblers, Dendroica townsendi
The Townsend's Warbler is one of the most distinctive of all the warblers, with its bright yellow upper breast and face with dark streaks. Its diet consists of insects and seeds.
The Townsend's Warbler spends its winters in California and migrates north to Oregon, Washington and southern Canada for the summer.
The Townsend's Warbler, Dendroica townsendi, is a small songbird of the New World warbler family.
These birds have a yellow face with a black stripe across their cheeks, a thin pointed bill, white wing bars, olive upperparts with black streaks on their backs and flanks, and a white belly. Adult males have a black cap, black throat and yellow lower breast; females have a dark cap and a yellow throat. Immature birds are similar to females with a dark green cap and cheeks.
Life history
Their breeding habitats are coniferous forests with large trees on the northwestern coast of North America. Their nests are shallow cups built with grass and lined with moss. These nests are usually placed atop a branch in a conifer. The female lays 4 to 5 eggs.
This bird is closely related to the Hermit Warbler, and the two species interbreed where their ranges overlap.
Birds from the Queen Charlotte Islands migrate short distances further south on the Pacific coast. Other birds winter in Mexico, Central America, and the south-western United States.
They forage actively in the higher branches, sometimes hovering or catching insects in flight. They mainly eat insects and spiders and seeds. Outside of the nesting season, these birds forage in mixed flocks. In winter, they also eat berries and plant nectar.
The song of the male bird is a buzzed zee-zee-zee-bzz-zee, somewhat similar to that of its eastern relative, the Black-throated Green Warbler. The call is a sharp tup.
This bird was named after the American ornithologist, John Kirk Townsend. Although Townsend is also credited with first describing this bird, he used a name chosen by Thomas Nuttall, who was travelling with him, and so sidestepped the convention against naming a species after oneself.
References
- BirdLife International (2004). Dendroica townsendi. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 10 May 2006. Database entry includes justification for why this species is of least concern
Copyright: Wikipedia. This article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. It uses material from Wikipedia.org
Relevant Web Resources: USGS ... Birds of Nova Scotia
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