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Nashville Warbler | Leiothlypis ruficapilla
Nashvillezanger | Reinita de Nashville
The Nashville Warbler is a small warbler with a grey head, a complete white eye-ring and yellow underparts. It breeds in Canada and the northern and western United States and winters mostly in Mexico, from the lowlands to the mountains. There it is one of the commonest wintering warblers.
Voice
The song has two parts: a series of high two-syllable notes followed by a rapid, lower trill, see-weet see-weet see-weet tititititi. The call is a sharp, metallic tsik.
Recording: Ray Cooke — CC BY-NC 4.0 · shortened to the first 60 s, mono · xeno-canto
Identification
11–12 cm. Head grey with a sharp, complete white eye-ring; a rufous crown patch is usually hidden. Back, wings and tail olive-green, without wingbars. Throat, breast and undertail coverts yellow; a whitish patch between the legs. The female and young birds are duller, with a browner-grey head and a pale yellow throat. Western birds have a yellower-green rump and move the tail more often.
Confusion species
Virginia's Warbler Leiothlypis virginiae has the same eye-ring but is grey with only a yellow breast patch, a yellow-green rump and yellow undertail coverts. MacGillivray's Warbler Geothlypis tolmiei and Mourning Warbler Geothlypis philadelphia are larger, with a grey hood extending to the breast. Orange-crowned Warbler Leiothlypis celata is duller, with a dark eyeline and faint breast streaks.
Habitat
In winter a wide range of vegetation: pine-oak and oak forest, dry forest, scrub, forest edges, riparian woodland, gardens and parks, from sea level to about 3000 m. It searches the foliage of the lower and middle levels for insects, often in mixed flocks.
Where the bird is most at home, classified by the vegetation units of Mexico and Central America.
Range and movements
Breeds in southern Canada, the north-eastern United States and the western United States. Migrates through northern Mexico. Winters from southern Texas through most of Mexico to Guatemala, in small numbers to El Salvador and Honduras; rare further south.
- Winter visitor (c. Oct–Mar)
- dark = core range, pale = thinly spread
How and when to look
In winter often the first warbler in mixed flocks in the pine-oak forests of the Mexican mountains, and common in gardens around cities such as Oaxaca. The complete white eye-ring is the best feature.
Conservation status
Not threatened (LC). Widespread and common; numbers are fairly stable.
Scientific name
Leiothlypis ruficapilla | (Wilson, 1811)
Wilson described the species in 1811 as Sylvia ruficapilla; because it was later moved to another genus, the author and year stand in brackets. The genus Leiothlypis was introduced in 2008 by Sangster. Leiothlypis is Ancient Greek, from leios 'plain, smooth' and thlypis, an unidentified small bird mentioned by Aristotle. ruficapilla is Latin, from rufus 'red' and capillus 'hair of the head', after the rufous crown patch. The specimen the first description was based on came from near Nashville, Tennessee (USA).