This afternoon, a "yellow adult" Pine Siskin appeared briefly in my yard to
bathe. An ID had me stumped. Its pale yellow face pattern resembled the
face of a first year Blackburnian Warbler but it displayed prominent
yellow wing bars like a Siskin's. It had very little underside stripping and
the breast and sides were yellow.
Being unfamiliar with a yellow phase of Pine Siskin, I browsed the
Dunn/Garrett Warbler guide to check out any similarity in my sighting to the
Golden-wing hybrids and other warblers without success. I then consulted
Sibley's Guide and immediately found a match-- Sibley's illustration of the
yellow adult Pine Siskin with the notation "scarce, most frequent found in the
southwest". It was like finding a new species, so different from the
appearances of the Pine Siskins that have come and gone through the yard this
past winter.
Besides the siskin, a pair of Chipping Sparrows made their first appearance
of the year today. A Fox Sparrow has been around for a week or so, a pair
of Red-breasted Nuthatches are still here, and a few more siskins are
back today. The only warbler to appear so far this year has been a Pine.
Ralph Wall
Great Falls, VA
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