[cobirds] Eastern Warbling Vireos, Boulder County, May 14, incl. thoughts on field ID

Hey, everybody.

Earlier this sunny Mother's Day morning, May 14, I heard and saw at least four eastern warbling-vireos (Vireo g. gilvus) at the Walden-Sawhill ponds complex, Boulder County. Here is a sound spectrogram of one of the birds:

This is the song of an eastern warbling-vireo because it is long (3+ sec.), sweet, fast, frenetic, and herky-jerky, with a high-pitched terminal "squirt!" note. It lacks burry ("modulated") elements, and the baseline frequency is around 2 kHz. Here is a photo of the bird giving this song:

The vireo appears large-billed and bright overall, with relatively low-contrast plumage. It was accompanied by another bird, perhaps its mate, that appeared identical in plumage.

Another eastern warbling-vireo at the Walden-Sawhill complex gave this song:

And yet another gave this song:

Audio of these three birds can be heard at my eBird checklist for the visit: http://ebird.org/ebird/view/checklist/S36842696

With decent study in the field, many warbling-vireos can be assigned to one taxon or the other. It's great to look at and listen to the birds, but, for documentation birds, nothing beats photos and audio. Especially audio.

In other bird news, the Walden-Sawhill complex was essentially devoid of migrants. If it hadn't been for a single yellow-rumped warbler, there wouldn't have been any! I gather Bill Kaempfer and Luke Pheneger absconded east with all the good Boulder County birds. Turncoats. Anyhow, other stuff at Walden-Sawhill this morning included a wayward wild turkey, a western wood-pewee, 5 eastern kingbirds, a yellow-breasted chat, and 4 Bullock orioles.

Ted Floyd

Lafayette, Boulder County

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