WINTER BACKYARD BIRDS (U.S. AND CANADA)

Yellow-Rumped Warbler

SCIENTIFIC NAME: Setophaga Coronate

North America officially recognized the two forms of Yellow-Rumped Warbler as conspecific, the Myrtle Warbler, and the Audubon's Warbler.

Most abundant wintering warbler in the U.S.

MYRTLE WARBLER: East

Adults have white or whitish throat strongly contrasting bright yellow rump and patch on sides of breast. They usually have a small yellow patch at the center of the crown, boldly streaked blue-gray or gray-brown upperparts, and double white wing bars. They have white tail spots near tips.

SUMMER PLUMAGE:

Males are streaked on underparts forming blackish breast bands.

Juveniles are gray and extensively streaked, with rump dull-white streaked with dark, not yellow.

WINTER:

In the first winter, yellow patches on the crown and sides of the breast are reduced, or even absent.

AUDOBON'S WARBLER: West

Males have a yellow throat and rump, and yellow patches on their sides.

Females tend to be grayer above with a yellow throat, yellow patches on their sides, and a yellow rump.

BILL: sharp, thin.

SIZE: measure ranges from 4.7 - 5.9 inches in length, with a wingspan of 7.5 - 9.4 inches.

WEIGHT: vary from 9.9 - 17.7 grams with an average between 11 - 14 grams.

COLOR: yellow, white, blue-gray, gray-brown and black.

Insects in summer, and on bay berries and wax myrtles, and other fruit in winter.

Open coniferous and mixed woodlands. Winters in open areas, along woodlands edges, second growth, dunes, marshes, and residential areas.

BREEDS: from Alaska and Canada, southward to the northern United States and southward through Mexico to Guatemala.

WINTER: the Atlantic and Gulf coasts, and locally in interior eastern United States, along the Pacific coast on the US, and in Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America.

CALL: Include a loud, hard, rather metallic “chek” or “tick”, and a thin “tsi”.

SONG: A slow and clear ‘tuwee-tuwee- tuwee-tuwee”, often changing in pitch towards the end, usually rising or falling at the end. They often sing from the high canopy of trees.