Length. -- 5.25 to 5.75 inches. A little smaller than the English
sparrow.
Male -- Crown, chin, throat, upper breast, and sides dull
chestnut. Forehead, sides of head, and cheeks black. Above
olive-gray, streaked with black. Underneath buffy. Two white
wing-bars. Outer tail quills with white patches on tips. Cream
white patch on either side of neck.
Female -- Has more greenish-olive above.
Range -- Eastern North America, from Hudson's Bay to Central
America. Nests north of the United States. Winters in tropical
limit of range.
Migrations -- May. September. Rare migrant
The chestnut breast of this capricious little visitor makes him look like a
diminutive robin. In spring, when these warblers are said to take a more
easterly route than the one they choose in autumn to return by to Central
America, they may be so suddenly abundant that the fresh green trees and
shrubbery of the garden will contain a dozen of the busy little hunters.
Another season they may pass northward either by another route or leave your
garden unvisited; and perhaps the people in the very next town may be counting
your rare bird common, while it is simply perverse.
Whether common or rare, before your acquaintance has had time to ripen into
friendship, away go the freaky little creatures to nest in the tree-tops of
the Canadian coniferous forests.
CHESTNUT-SIDED WARBLER (Dendroica pennsylvanica) Wood Warbler
family