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Blue-Winged Warbler
Adult male--Upper parts light olive green; wings and tail bluish; wing shows two broken white bars; crown and under parts brilliant yellow. The black line in front and back of the eye is a distinctive feature.
Adult female--Under parts somewhat less bright. Length--4.80. The young in first plumage are nearly as bright as the adult.
Breeding Range--Eastern States, from Connecticut and southern New York southward.
The nest is placed on the ground in clearings, scrubby places, and in the undergrowth of woodland or second growth. It varies greatly, being sometimes a very rough structure of coarse grass, weeds, leaves, bark, and tendrils, and sometimes a compact and well-made nest of the same materials. to 6 eggs are laid; they are white, with very few spots of brownish red, except round the larger end, where they are more numerous. Size--.62 x .51.
Although in some places this warbler is very common, the nest is always hard to find. I have seen as many as twenty pairs of these birds in a day during the breeding season, and yet not one nest could I find. When the young are hatched it is, of course, much more easy to find the nest, as the female may then be seen carrying food to them. As far as I have been able to ascertain by observation, the female alone supplies the young with food, the male usually accompanying her until within a short distance of the nest, or even to the nest itself, but I have never seen him carry food. When these birds are seen to be very much excited there is every reason for believing that the young, which in all probability have very recently left the nest, are not far away; they may easily be found, as the parent birds (both male and female take part in feeding the young after they have left the nest) feed them constantly. Near New York nesting begins about the third week in May.