Birds

Warblers

Small, restless, mostly insect-eating birds, and for most of the year somewhere else. The American ones pass through Brooklyn on migration, north in May in their brightest plumage and south again in September in duller ones, when they become the classic identification headache. The Old World warblers of Europe are not related at all; they share the name because early naturalists saw small brown birds that sang and reached for the same word.

The Blackpoll Warbler, one of the plainest of them, makes one of the longest non-stop flights of any songbird: from the north-east coast straight out over the Atlantic to South America, two or three days in the air, on a bird that weighs about the same as two sheets of paper.

• American Redstart Setophaga ruticilla
• Black-and-white Warbler Mniotilta varia
• Black-throated Blue Warbler Setophaga caerulescens
• Black-throated Green Warbler Setophaga virens
• Blackcap Sylvia atricapilla
• Blackpoll Warbler Setophaga striata
• Common Chiffchaff Phylloscopus collybita
• Common Yellowthroat Geothlypis trichas
• Magnolia Warbler Setophaga magnolia
• Nashville Warbler Leiothlypis ruficapilla
• Northern Parula Setophaga americana
• Northern Waterthrush Parkesia noveboracensis
• Orange-crowned Warbler Leiothlypis celata
• Palm Warbler Setophaga palmarum
• Sardinian Warbler Curruca melanocephala
• Townsend's Warbler Setophaga townsendi
• Wilson's Warbler Cardellina pusilla
• Yellow Warbler Setophaga petechia
• Yellow-rumped Warbler Setophaga coronata