In honor of this first full day of Spring, here’s a bird that will soon be arriving in tree tops as far north as Canada. This is the Northern Parula, a warbler that doesn’t have that word in it’s name for some reason I can’t find.
This is perhaps my favorite picture from my trip to the Magee Marsh in northwest Ohio last May for the Biggest Week in American Birding. I like it so much because northern parulas are so difficult to capture in a photo. They spend most of their time high up in the canopy, eating insects and flitting about. Birders hear them more often than they get a good look at them.
The experts at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology say northern parulas have an odd break in their breeding range. They breed from Florida north to the boreal forest of Canada, but skip parts of Iowa, Wisconsin, Michigan, and some states in the Northeast. They think the reason for their absence may have to do with habitat loss and increasing air pollution, which affects the growth of moss on trees that they depend on for nesting.
However you’re spending this first full day of Spring—I plan to watch NCAA basketball all afternoon—keep this image with you to add a little extra beauty to your day!