Yet another beautiful vagrant has been spotted on our shores, the Orange-crowned Warbler!

As you can see from the map, the Orange-crowned Warbler is nowhere near its winter range. This, from Cornell, “Medium to long-distance nocturnal migrant. Many birds winter in Mexico, with some continuing south to Guatemala and Belize. Others winter in central California and the southern U.S.”

Finding insects in the brush, bark, and rotting wood

Finding plenty of insects in rotting pieces of driftwood, peeling bark, and drying seaweed, the little fellow is very active and seems relatively unperturbed by the below freezing temperatures of the past month. Orange-crowned Warblers are purported to be one of the most hardiest of warblers. I met up with some old time knowledgeable gentlemen birders and they shared that about once a year an OCW shows up in Massachusetts, but rarely as far east as Cape Ann.

After looking at the photos you may wonder, as did I, why this yellowish-olive green songbird is so named ‘orange crowned?’ You can just barely see a very slight rusty orange hued patch of feathers when its head is bowed forward.

beautiful birds