Bird of the Week

Yellow-breasted Chat, Icteria virens Bill Rowe Most birders will agree that the Yellow-breasted Chat is a cool bird—it’s handsome, interesting, and …different. Through many decades and many iterations of field guides, it was classified among the warblers in the family…

Bonaparte’s Gull, Chroicocephalus philadelphia Bill Rowe Bonaparte’s Gull, the smallest of our four common gull species, breeds far to our north, in the Canadian and Alaskan taiga (a Russian word meaning the boreal forest of pine, fir, and spruce). There, unlike…

Savannah Sparrow, Passerculus sandwichensis Bill Rowe The Savannah Sparrow could compete for a prize as Most Abundant Bird That No One But Birders Ever Heard Of. It doesn’t nest around here, and the numbers that spend the winter are variable, but during…

Canvasback, Aythya valisineria Bill Rowe North America’s ducks come in a wide assortment of shapes, colors, and sizes; here in the Midwest, late fall, winter, and early spring are the prime times for enjoying the greatest variety of ducks before most…

Baird’s Sandpiper, Calidris bairdii Bill Rowe Above, you see another of the Olympic-level migrants among our shorebirds—not as famous as, say, the American Golden-Plover, but every bit as astonishing in the scope of its annual journey from the Arctic tundra to…

Red Phalarope, Phalaropus fulicarius Bill Rowe It’s time to introduce the phalaropes, a colorful group of three small shorebirds. One species, Wilson’s Phalarope, is strictly North American and also the commonest on migration here in the Midwest. The other two, the…

Palm Warbler, Setophaga palmarum Bill Rowe As we’ve noted before, Missouri has a rich diversity of warblers: 36 regular species, of which 17 are breeding birds, leaving 19 more that we see only in migration, en route to and from…

Northern Flicker, Colaptes auratus Bill Rowe In late winter and early spring, our local resident songbirds, such as Song Sparrows and Red-winged Blackbirds, begin practicing their songs, following their instinct to claim a territory and find a mate. One of these…

Ring-necked Duck, Aythya collaris Bill Rowe Ducks, ducks, ducks… We are still in the middle of duck migration at this point, as it begins very early, in February, with many species reaching their peak during March. These include the diving ducks…