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Re: VA Nashville likely an orange-crowned

From:

"Gail B. Mackiernan "

Reply-To:

Gail B. Mackiernan

Date:

Tue, 9 Jan 2007 13:50:33 +0000

Actually Orange-crowned is a far more unusual bird -- Nashvilles are common fall migrants.

Did the bird have the distinctive faint and somewhat blurry gray streaking on the sides of the breast that are typical of OC in almost all plumages? Also OC has a supercilium, not an eyering, although this can be poorly-defined. It also always has yellow or yellowish undertail coverts, one of the best ways for separating from dull fall Tennessees,  to me still the major  "confusion species." The latter point isn't going to help you with Nashville, though, they also have yellow undertails. However Nashville is a small warbler, very agile and active and Orange-crowned is larger, more deliberate and sluggish. Finally, fall OC are usually pretty dull yellow or even grayish-yellow, Nashvilles are *usually* brighter in fall though this can vary. The OC that wintered at the Arbortem a few years ago was fairly bright, and interestingly, there was also a Nashville with it, both feeding at sap holes in small maples in the Asian Collection. A good comparison study!

Gail Mackiernan
Colesville, MD

-------------- Original message ----------------------
From: Howard Youth <>
> Dear fellow Ospreyers. I fear I fell into the orange-crowned warbler 
> trap when I announced that I'd spotted a Nashville at Hunting Creek. 
> Subsequent research leads me to believe that the variability of 
> orange-crowned warblers led this gray-headed, yellow-bodied, faint 
> eye-ringed bird to lead me. It seduced me into believing it was 
> something  more rare. Anyway, I'm pleased to have seen (most 
> probably) an orange-crowned.
> 
<snip>
> Howard Youth
> Bethesda, MD
>