Blackburnian Warbler ( Setophaga fusca ) Family: Parulidae The Blackburnian Warbler is a small songbird with a bright orange throat and face with a black crown, broad white wingbars, and a triangular ear patch. Females and juveniles are paler and yellower overall. They have a thin call that increases in speed that sounds like sleet-sleet-sleet-sleetee-sleeeee. They live in woodland areas, specifically conifers in the summer and humid mountain forests in the winter. They eat mostly insects and especially enjoy caterpillars. During summer they will eat many caterpillars and sometimes beetles, ants, flies, and spiders. During winter they will branch out and feed on some berries as well. Blackburnian Warblers feed mostly in treetops, looking for insects along small branches. They will also search in dead leaf clumps or hover to take insects from the underside of leaves. Males tend to forage higher in the trees than females. Blackburnian Warblers will court the female by singing and p
I awoke well before dawn on April 6, 2019. A night of fitful, anxious sleep pushed me out of bed. After a year of planning, I was eager to start work at Smith Oaks Bird Sanctuary in High Island, Texas. Walking about a quarter of a mile east into the sanctuary, I reached the rookery in the middle of Claybottom Pond. I placed my microphones next to the pond, scrambled up a small hill, nestled myself under a tunnel of trees, and pressed ‘Record’. Over the next 45 minutes in the pre-dawn light, I listened to the sounds of hundreds of water birds reverberate across the pond, through the trees, and into my headphones. It was a moment I’ll never forget. That recording was the first of hundreds my team and I would make on our 2,000+ mile journey from the Gulf Coast of Texas and Louisiana to the Minnesota/Canada border. This effort was part of the ‘Voices of a Flyway’ project that I dreamt into existence over the previous year. Supported by National Geographic, our team of three followed a