Yellow Warbler

Setophaga petechia · Warblers

Yellow Warbler, male

Prospect Park, 25 May 2026

A male Yellow Warbler in Prospect Park in late May, back from Central America to breed in the willows and shrubs at the water's edge. It is the most widespread warbler in North America, from Alaska to Mexico, and one of the few that breeds in the park rather than passing through.

One of the few warblers that is genuinely, almost entirely yellow, including the wing and tail edges; the fine chestnut streaking on the breast marks a male. Yellow Warblers have a specific defence against Brown-headed Cowbirds, which lay eggs in other species' nests: on finding a cowbird egg, a Yellow Warbler will build a new nest floor over the whole clutch and start again, sometimes stacking several floors in a season.

Yellow Warbler, late

Prospect Park, 11 October 2025

A Yellow Warbler in Prospect Park in the second week of October, which is the odd part. Yellow Warblers breed in willow scrub and wet thickets across the whole continent and are among the earliest to leave; most have left New York by the middle of September, so this one is a straggler, well behind the rest of its kind.

Bright yellow from the face right through to the undertail, a plain face with the dark eye standing out on it, and yellow edges to the wing feathers, which is what separates it from the other plain yellow warblers of autumn. A Pine Warbler would show white wing bars and a heavier bill; an Orange-crowned would be duller and greener; a Wilson's has plain olive wings with no yellow in them at all.