Sunday, April 19, 2020

Warbler Guy, I saw your San Francisco birding tours note you have seen nesting warblers in the San Francisco Bay Area. The San Francisco Bay Area has warblers nesting here?

Horatio (in Sunnyvale, CA):

Yes, depending on your perch in the SF Bay Area, there's both resident, year-round wood-warbler species as well as neotropical migrants that return annually to nest here.

The following list, below, is a simplified, non-detailed overview of the nesters in Marin County without providing details:

(Note the * = nester as a spring/summer resident and # = a year-round nester that is resident year-round. In addition, it's important to realize that a few individuals of all wood-warblers in the Bay Area may persist throughout the non-breeding season (though the vast bulk of the * species vacate the Bay Area during the non-breeding season. + = non-breeding season resident only).

* and # Common Yellowthroat (with much of the area hosting two subspecies, including the CA Species of Special concern sinuosa subspecies)

Yellow Warbler (extirpated from the majority of previous breeding areas and/or only periodically nesting in previously occupied nesting habitat)

Orange-crowned Warbler (Note this species persists in small numbers throughout the "winter," but the large pulse of returning nesters begins in February and peaks in March.)

Wilson's Warbler

* Yellow-rumped Warbler (ALSO note: LARGE numbers present during the non-breeding season at low elevations, but most of the nesters occur at higher altitudes in select Bay Area locations only.)

* Hermit Warbler

* Black-throated Gray Warbler

* Yellow-breasted Chat (extirpated from portions of its previous breeding range; largely absent throughout most of the SF Bay Area)

MacGillivray's Warbler

Townsend's Warbler (non-breeding season resident only)

Regards to you Horatio and all warbler seekers of this special family....Daniel

warblerwatch.com (hosts my bird guiding and birding tour information via the "Birding Tours" section)

415-382-1827, Novato, CA