| Chestnut-sided Warblers have a thin chestnut line along their breast that gives the bird its name. Both sexes are similar, with a yellow and green crest and a streaked back and white underparts. The bill is thin and pointed, the legs are black, and the wings are barred with white or yellow. They have a white patch on their cheek accentuated by a black eyestripe that extends down the sides of the throat. Their "pleased, pleased, pleased, pleased to meet you" song can also help to identify this bird. In the winter the plumage becomes duller and the brown streaks may be reduced to spots. When perched it will often elevate its tail while drooping its wings. Immature birds lack the rust colored sides and the bright crown. Before they mature they appear olive-green above and whitish below.
They arrive in their breeding habitat around mid-May which consists of the open and second growth woodlands of the northeastern quarter of the United States, north into southern Canada and south along through Appalachian mountains as far south as northern Georgia. They move south in September and October. The winter habitat is the forests in Nicaragua and Panama and it is among the most common birds along the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica.
Unlike most other eastern songbirds the Chestnut-sided Warbler has actually benefited from the fragmentation of the forests in the eastern part of the country. John James Audubon only recorded one siting of these birds during his lifetime but as abandoned pastures have grown into shrubby woodlands this beautiful bird has become more plentiful. It is now declining somewhat as the shrubby lands return to forests. And though this habitat makes this warbler a frequent Cowbird host, it sometimes destroys the eggs of the Cowbird.
The clutch consists of 4 white eggs marked with brown. The eggs are laid in a nest made of bark, stems, and grass and lined with hair usually placed low in a tree or bush. The eggs are incubated by the female for 12 to 13 days and fledge the nest about 10 or 12 days later. The young are cared for by both parents while they remain in the nest.
The diet consist mostly of insects including caterpillars, lice, ants, leaf-hoppers, and bark beetles. Occasionally they will make short flights while hawking flying insects and they will also eat berries and seeds when insects are scarce.
Length: 4 1/2 to 5 1/2 inches
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