Last Push for the D’ville Hundo

Yellow-rumped Warbler Setophaga coronata
(with apparent Xanthochromism)

Yellow-rumped Warbler Setophaga coronata
(with apparent Xanthochromism)

The bird doesn't raise eyebrows when
 the yellow is removed from the equation...

American Redstart Setophaga ruticilla

Chestnut-sided Warbler Setophaga pensylvanica

Yellow Warbler Setophaga petechia

Wilson’s Warbler Cardellina pusilla

Common Yellowthroat Geothlypis trichas

Warbling Vireo Vireo gilvus

Scarlet Tanager Piranga olivacea

Great Crested Flycatcher Myiarchus crinitus

Eastern Kingbird Tyrannus tyrannus

Baltimore Oriole Icterus galbula

Bobolink Dolichonyx oryzivorous

Brown-headed Cowbird Molothrus ater

Osprey Pandion haliaetus
(with full crop)

Black-crowned Night Heron Nycticorax nycticorax

Common Tern Sterna hirundo

Blue-winged Teal Anas discors

Northern Green Frog Rama clamitans

Muskrat Ondatra zibethicus

Reserve Faunique Marguerite-D’Youville, Île Sainte-Bernard, Châteauguay, May 18, 2021

  Another fun stab at a hundred species for D’ville, with 83 species encountered in 11 hours of birding. We logged ten warbler species on the day, but it didn’t feel like it. Numbers were thin, and there were no noticeable warbler waves. It felt odd, given the time of year, that we didn’t run into any Black-throated Green, Black-throated Blue, or Magnolia Warblers, among others. Besides warblers, the day’s list was also light on deep water ducks, raptors, and sparrows, which didn’t do us any favours.

  We probably won’t try for 100 there again this spring, but it is a number that is definitely in sight. It could be done if we showed up before dawn and had a bit more luck with timing…but right now, it seems like the Venn diagram circles of arriving/departing/breeding birds are already pulling apart. It was entertaining to try for it.

  The day was hot, with barely a puff of wind all day — a massive contrast to the wintry weather of just a week earlier. Stay hydrated!

  One of the last birds of the day was an odd bird indeed. A warbler was spotted in a small tree on the southern tip of the island, at about 7:30pm. It initially had me super confused. I briefly thought it was something nutty like a Townsend’s Warbler. Nah. Then I got better looks at the yellow throat and overall Yellow-rumped Warbler vibe, and ambitiously pegged it for an Audubon’s Warbler, the western counterpart to our white-throated Myrtle Warbler, the eastern subspecies of Yellow-rumped Warbler. When I got home and was able to review some more images in field guides and online, the long Myrtle-like supercilium and yellow speckling on the chest had me thinking it was a Myrtle x Audubon’s hybrid, with maybe even some Magnolia Warbler influence, if such a thing is possible. After kicking the images around on bird ID groups, a new possibility emerged — a straight-up Myrtle Warbler, but with Xanthochromism, an unusual excess of yellow pigmentation. This seems to match up best with the overall markings of this bird, which are pretty standard for Myrtle Warbler, yellow notwithstanding.

  All in all, it was a fun bird to puzzle over in the field. I was all sore and cranky by that point in the day (hour #10 of birding), but after seeing it, all of that went away. My knees were new again. I was uber amped. Gotta love birding.

  Oh yeah, right at the end, an insect flew into my open gob and got stuck, wriggling, in my throat. It was hilarious.