Pine Warbler

Mount Julian. ON. July 19, 2023. That quiet found in the hour as the sun rises is nowhere better experienced than on the shore of one of thousands of lakes scattered throughout the once-ancient forests of Ontario.

On this perfect summer day, the only sounds of dawn were those of birds. Not the clamour of spring now but many quieter contact notes shared between parents and young.  First the wake-up wail of a Common Loon far out on the still lake, then distinctively, the call of Herring Gulls on distant rocky islets where they nest, and the gurgle of a pack of Common Ravens passing overhead. A Red-eyed Vireo got started on his day’s task of repeating the same short phrases, once every few seconds until dusk, more than twenty-thousand repetitions by day’s end. A Song Sparrow and an Eastern Phoebe were quietly foraging for food but the best of the morning was a surprise, the clear song of a Pine Warbler from overhead. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been surprised, White Pines made up at least 50% of the shoreline trees and the birds are appropriately named.

Pine Warblers sing a melodic trill that is an early marker of the arrival of spring: around home we hear the first sometime around mid-April; two or three weeks before the big wave of neo-tropicals.  Those first songs are easily heard, but the bird prefers the upper levels of pines so is not as easily seen. Some might disagree with melodic as appropriate but when compared to the similar and confusable but drier song of a Chipping Sparrow, the Pine has melody on its side. (If you’re really interested, try this corner of the Xeno-canto site and browse the many recording. The fifth on the list at 58 seconds provides a good example.) Among warblers the Pine is not a visual show-stopper being generally washed in yellow-greens and that, plus its propensity for staying high and out of sight, sometimes leaves it in the ranks of afterthoughts.

But today’s Pine Warbler was different. Aware perhaps of the conventional wisdom as described above, it chose several upgrades: It sang musically, it ventured down quite low, low enough for me to get several good photos and was decidedly colourful. No afterthought, without question it was My Bird of the Day.