New World warblers | Parulidae

Amerikaanse zangers | Reinitas

Small, short-billed insect-eaters of the foliage, nine to fifteen centimetres long and rarely heavier than fifteen grams. They work through a tree crown systematically, picking caterpillars and aphids from the undersides of leaves, hanging from a twig tip or catching an insect in a short sally. In the migratory species the plumage changes strongly with the season: in spring the males wear sharply defined patches of yellow, black, blue, orange or chestnut, and after the moult male, female and young bird often look greenish and vaguely marked, so that a wintering bird has to be identified on details such as undertail coverts, leg colour and wing bars. Mexico and Central America are the main wintering grounds of these migrants, which sometimes cross the Gulf of Mexico in a single flight and in winter are found here in every type of forest in mixed flocks. There are also many resident species, such as those of Basileuterus and Myiothlypis, the Myioborus species that flush insects with a spread tail, and in the mountains of Mexico and Guatemala the Red Warbler and the Pink-headed Warbler. The family is found only in the Americas.