American Redstart, female
Setophaga ruticilla
American Redstart · Green-Wood Cemetery · 29 August 2026
A female American Redstart at Green-Wood at the end of August, heading south to the Caribbean after a summer in the woods of the North. Redstarts breed in second-growth woodland across the East and pass through Brooklyn in numbers both ways.
Grey-headed and olive above with yellow rather than the male's orange: the female and first-year male pattern, brightening to orange-and-black only once a male reaches full adult plumage in its second year. Redstarts hunt more like flycatchers than typical warblers, flashing the tail open to startle insects into moving and then chasing them down in short sallies.
Birds, insects, plants and other wildlife, mostly from Brooklyn, with some from further afield.
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