
Philadelphia Sees Largest Mass Collision Event in the City in 70 Years
Reflecting on the “gruesome and overwhelming” day, experts remain hopeful that the event will inspire action for bird-friendly communities.
Breeding adult male. Photo: Andy Reago and Chrissy McClarren/Flickr (CC BY 2.0)
Mniotilta varia
Conservation status | Has disappeared from some former nesting areas, especially in South and Midwest. Still widespread and common. |
---|---|
Family | Wood Warblers |
Habitat | Woods; trunks, limbs of trees. Breeds in mature or second-growth forests, deciduous and mixed. Often in woods on dry, rocky hillsides and ravines. Also nests in dry portions of wooded swamps. In migration, seen most often on trunks and low branches of trees within woodlands and thickets. In winter in the tropics, found in trees from sea level to high in the mountains. |
Adapted to creeping along limbs and on tree trunks to feed. Switches body from side to side at each hop while foraging. In early spring, takes dormant insects from tree trunks and branches. Sometimes flies out after flying insects.
5, sometimes 4, rarely 6. Creamy white, flecked with brown at large end. Incubated by female only, 10-12 days. Commonly parasitized by cowbirds. Young: Fed by both parents. Leave the nest 8-12 days after hatching, before they are able to fly well.
Fed by both parents. Leave the nest 8-12 days after hatching, before they are able to fly well.
Insects. Feeds on a wide variety of caterpillars (including those of gypsy moths), beetles (including bark beetles, click beetles, and wood borers), ants, flies, bugs, leafhoppers, aphids, and other insects; also spiders and daddy longlegs.
Males arrive on breeding grounds in late April, before the females. During courtship, male chases female, with much singing and fluttering. Nest: Placed on ground (or less than 2' up), under dead leaves or limbs, against a shrub, rock, log, or tree. Usually constructed in cavity at top of stump or in a depression in the ground. Open cup (built by female) made of leaves, coarse grass stems, bark strips, pine needles, rootlets; lined with fine grass or hair.
Audubon’s scientists have used 140 million bird observations and sophisticated climate models to project how climate change will affect this bird’s range in the future.
Zoom in to see how this species’s current range will shift, expand, and contract under increased global temperatures.
Choose a temperature scenario below to see which threats will affect this species as warming increases. The same climate change-driven threats that put birds at risk will affect other wildlife and people, too.
Reflecting on the “gruesome and overwhelming” day, experts remain hopeful that the event will inspire action for bird-friendly communities.
Migrants have started arriving—and with them, plenty of confusion. This guide to commonly confused songs will help.
The voracious crawlers are now chewing through leaf litter in Minnesota and Chicago and disrupting understory where some birds nest.
Let us send you the latest in bird and conservation news.
Visit your local Audubon center, join a chapter, or help save birds with your state program.
Membership benefits include one year of Audubon magazine and the latest on birds and their habitats. Your support helps secure a future for birds at risk.
Our email newsletter shares the latest programs and initiatives.