Wintering Yellow-rumped Warblers

Each winter several Yellow-rumped Warblers winter in several areas of southeast Colo including Canon City. Today I found 3 Yellow-rumped Warblers in a local park in Canon City that is just about a half mile from where I live. We received about 3 inches of snow today, and it was snowing when I was taking pics (which creates problems with lighting). All three birds were foraging actively, flitting around a group of evergreen trees, chipping loudly.

I also found several Cassin's Finches, including one male, in the same park. Though Cassin's are usually uncommon here, I had one female Cassin's Finch at my feeders and found several more females on Temple Canyon Rd on the far west side of town. Other birds on Temple Canyon Road were both Mountain and Western Bluebirds and one Northern Shrike. SeEtta

Post note--I forgot to note that both of these pics will enlarge for more detailed views by double-clicking on each one.

Common warbler with uncommon beauty

Yellow-rumped Warblers are the most common Warbler in Colo but they are uncommonly beautiful in their fresh breeding (Alternate) plumage. Their bright yellow throats, sides, crowns and rumps are really set off by the black and white on the rest of their bodie parts.

This bird has a white throat which makes it a Myrtle subspecies (Audubon's subspecies have yellow throats). This species of warbler is a generalist--it works high, medium and low in trees, sometimes hops down on the ground to eat a tasty morsel, sallies out to catch flying insects and gleans leaves. This beauty was feeding in a cottonwood tree on the Canon City Riverwalk.
SeEtta

Carolina Wren & Yellow-rumped Warblers along Canon City Riverwalk

I walked the west section of the Canon City Riverwalk this morning, the first time since early fall. And it was a great day to do this--the temps came close to 70 again for the second time this week, and boy were the birds out and about. I ran into the other Canon City birder, Rich, and we birded together for awhile. I told him I had seen a Cooper's Hawk fly close overhead and he said he had also seen an accipiter, likely the same one given timing and location, also. He trumped the single Yellow-rumped Warbler I had seen with his count of 9.

We talked about the Carolina Wren that he had found on the Riverwalk last year in this area. Though he had not heard it for awhile, other birders had reported having seen or heard it in the past month or so. After we walked several hundred yards away from the location where he had heard this wren before, I heard the distinctive call that is often described phonetically as "tea kettle, tea kettle, tea kettle." It doesn't really sound like that, or other phonetic descriptions, to me but it is nonetheless distinctive. This shy wren would not come out to be seen and stopped singing when walked nearby on the trail (as opposed to the Carolina Wren that several of us saw and got to watch for several minutes at the Lamar Woods area during the Snow Goose Festival).

There were more nice birds there today but I will put them in my next posts or this would be too long.
SeEtta