Length: About 5½ inches.
Male: Forehead, cheeks, breast, and belly yellow; _back_ of _crown_ and
_throat black_, the two dark areas _united by a black line_; _mask
yellow_; back and rump olive; wings and tail a dark grayish-olive;
the _outer tail-feathers largely white_ on their _inner webs_.
Female: Similar to male, but without the black hood; dark edge to crown;
breast faintly washed with black.
Song: E. H. Eaton in his "_Birds of New York_" writes: "The song of this
warbler is one of the few which the author can hear with perfect
distinctness and enjoy." He adds that it is described by Langille as
follows: "_che-reek, che-reek, che-reek, chi-de-ee_, the first three
with a loud, bell-like ring, the rest much accelerated with a
falling inflection."
Habitat: Trees of deep woods.
Range: Eastern United States, west to the Plains, north and east to
southern Michigan and Ontario, western and southeastern New York,
and southern New England; in winter, West Indies, eastern Mexico,
Central America, and Panama.
This warbler looks as though it had nearly divided a large hood,--had
slipped one half of it back on its head like a calash, and allowed the
other half to remain under its chin. It is easy to identify by its
appearance and its song, and its habit of living in the lower parts of
trees.
Eaton says: "The nest of the Hooded Warbler is usually placed in a low
sapling or bush from 1 to 3 feet from the ground. In my experience it is
the easiest of all the warbler nests to find. Wherever I have noticed a
Hooded warbler singing in a patch of woodland, I have been very
successful in locating the nest by placing my eye close to the ground
and looking through the shrubbery from below the cover of the
undergrowth. Then the nest will almost surely be seen if one is within a
few rods, appearing like a bunch of leaves a short distance above the
ground."