VA Birders,
This morning, about 9:30 am, as I was watching some Am. Robins bathing in
the Bird Stream at Fort C.F. Smith Park in Arlington Co., a small bird with
yellow underparts came down to check out the stream. At first I thought it
might be a fall Magnolia Warbler, but I quickly realized that it had no white
in
the tail, nor did it have white wingbars. Then I remembered a conversation I
had several years ago when we tried to make a fall Tennessee Warbler into a
Philadelphia Vireo, about the warbler having white undertail coverts and the
vireo having yellow ones. Fortunately, I was able to check this bird and note
that it was yellow all the way from the throat down to the tail. It had white
lines above and below the dark eye (which almost looked like white crescents),
but no dark line above the eye. Its head and neck were gray above and its
back was more of an olive-gray. The bird flew back up in the trees next to the
stream where I got a few more quick looks at it before it took off, perhaps
intimidated by the robins.
It's been several years since I last saw a Philadelphia Vireo, and the
last one I saw was in the spring, so I checked my National Geographic and
Sibley
guides carefully before I was convinced that this bird was indeed a fall
Philadelphia Vireo.
We also saw several raptors at Ft. Smith this morning, including both
vultures, an Osprey, 2 Red-shoulders, a Red-tail, and an Am. Kestrel.
Val Kitchens
Arlington, VA
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