Yellow-throated Warbler

Dendroica dominica

Order PASSERIFORMES - Family PARULIDAE

Menu

1. Cool Facts
2. Description
3. Similar Species
4. Sound
5. Range
6. Habitat
7. Food
8. Behavior
9. Reproduction
10. Conservation Status
11. Other Names

One of the "southeastern" warblers, the Yellow-throated Warbler is a bird of tall trees. It nests and forages high in the canopy of swamp and pine forests.

Cool Facts

• The breeding range of the Yellow-throated Warbler is more southerly, its wintering range more northerly, and it has a more extensive resident population in the southern United States than most other warblers.

Description

• Size: 13-14 cm (5-6 in)
• Wingspan: 21 cm (8 in)
• Weight: 9-11 g (0.32-0.39 ounces)

• Small songbird.
• Yellow throat and chest.
• Gray back.
• Black face connecting to stripes down sides.
• White eyestripe.
• White earpatch.
• Two white wingbars.

• Large bill.
• White crescent under eye.
• Lower chest and belly white.
• White spots in tail.
• Eyes black.
• Bill black.
• Legs black.

Sex Differences

Sexes similar, but female duller.

Immature

Similar to adult, but duller, and female may be washed brownish on back.

Similar Species

• Female Blackburnian Warbler similar, but has yellow stripe over eyes and pale stripes on back.
• Common Yellowthroat can be confused in name only. It is greenish and lacks wingbars, and the male has a solid black mask. It is found low to the ground in wet areas, not high in the treetops.

Sound

Song a series of clear, slurred notes dropping slightly in pitch. Call a loud, sharp "chip."

»listen to songs of this species

Range

Summer Range

Breeds from Iowa to Pennsylvania and New Jersey, southward to eastern Texas and Florida.

Winter Range

Winters from Georgia and Texas southward to Central America and Caribbean.

Habitat

Breeds in pine forest, sycamore-baldcypress swamp and riparian woodland. Found in migration and winter in a variety of woodland, scrub, brush and thicket situations but most frequently in pine woodland if such habitat is available.

Food

Insects and spiders.

Behavior

Foraging

Forages by creeping along tree branches, probing into cracks, crevices, bundles of pine needles, and Spanish moss.

Reproduction

Nest Type

Often a cup-shaped pocket in Spanish moss, lined with grasses, weeds, feathers, and strands of moss woven into the nest. Open nests are made of bark strips, grasses, and weed stems, lined with plant down and feathers. Placed high in tree.

Egg Description

Pale greenish with dark speckles.

Clutch Size

3-5 eggs.

Condition at Hatching

Helpless.

Conservation Status

Populations appear stable; appears to be expanding breeding range northward.

Other Names

Paruline gorge jaune (French)
Reinita gorgiamarilla, Verdín de garganta amarilla (Spanish)

Sources used to construct this page:

Hall, G. A. 1996. Yellow-throated Warbler (Dendroica dominica). In The Birds of North America, No. 223 (A. Poole and F. Gill, eds.). The Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, and The American Ornithologists' Union, Washington, D.C.