Date: Tue, 16 Apr 2002 11:09:36 EDT Reply-To: Maryland Birds & Birding Sender: Maryland Birds & Birding From: Paul O'Brien Subject: Upper Watts Branch Park for 4/16 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="US-ASCII" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Most of yesterday's birds were still around along with Parula and Palm (Yellow) Warblers. Today we saw both solitarius and alticola subspecies of Blue-headed Vireo. The differences are quite noticeable. In solitarius the back has a strong yellow-green wash that sharply contrasts with the gray head, and the flanks are strongly washed with yellow right up to the shoulder. In alticola the back lacks the yellow and appears gray, showing no contrast with the head. It also lacks the yellow wash on the sides except near the tail. It's as though alticola was dipped into the yellow dye only up to the rump whereas solitarius was dipped in right up to the base of the neck. The nominate solitarius is the common breeder to our north, while alticola breeds in the southern Appalachians, including Garrett Co. A few pass through Montgomery Co. every spring, probably having moved north along the coastal plain and then following the Potomac Valley to their breeding grounds. Paul O'Brien Rockville, Mont. Co., MD pobrien776@aol.com ======================================================================= To leave the MDOsprey list, send e-mail to listserv@home.ease.lsoft.com with the following message in line 1: signoff mdosprey ======================================================================= =========================================================================