#374 Yellow-throated Warbler
I was in Prospect Park today to look for yesterday’s Blue Grosbeak (found it) and generally see what else might have been chased in by the storms. Although chilly, quite a few birds were active and it was a quite good day. About 1:00 I ran into Starr Saphir for the second time on the Peninsula Meadow. She’d come out to see the Blue Grosbeak with Lenore Swenson, Anne Lazarus, and some other Manhattan birders. (They found it too, though not everyone looking for it did. It seemed to disappear for up to an hour at a time before popping back up at the same location in the Vale of Cashmere.) Anyway, she told me that Pete Shen had told her that Alex Wilson had spotted a Yellow-throated Warbler on Three Sisters Island. So we all trotted off to Three Sisters as fast we could manage. I got their first, but did not find the bird. Starr arrived, pished a little, and damned if the bird didn’t fly right over to her. Then it flew back into the phragmites and hopped around, gleaning insects off the reeds.
Yellow-throated Warbler is a southern species that often overshoots on migration. There’s usually one or two sightings in Prospect Park each year, but I’d never managed to catch it before so this was my ninth life bird of the year and second in Prospect Park.
My total species count for the day was 48:
- Canada Goose
- Mute Swan
- Mallard
- Ring-necked Duck
- Ruddy Duck
- Double-crested Cormorant
- Great Blue Heron
- Great Egret
- Black-crowned Night-Heron
- Red-tailed Hawk
- American Coot
- Laughing Gull
- Ring-billed Gull
- Herring Gull
- Great Black-backed Gull
- Rock Pigeon
- Mourning Dove
- Red-bellied Woodpecker
- Yellow-bellied Sapsucker
- Downy Woodpecker
- Northern Flicker
- Eastern Phoebe
- Blue Jay
- American Crow
- Tree Swallow
- Barn Swallow
- Black-capped Chickadee
- Tufted Titmouse
- White-breasted Nuthatch
- American Robin
- European Starling
- Yellow-rumped Warbler
- Yellow-throated Warbler
- Pine Warbler
- Palm Warbler
- Chipping Sparrow
- Fox Sparrow
- Song Sparrow
- White-throated Sparrow
- Dark-eyed Junco
- Northern Cardinal
- Rose-breasted Grosbeak
- Blue Grosbeak
- Red-winged Blackbird
- Common Grackle
- Brown-headed Cowbird
- American Goldfinch
- House Sparrow
