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Golden-winged Warbler in South Portland

Warbler migration has just about peaked and the diversity we’re seeing in southern Maine has been great this year. Our warbler walks at Evergreen Cemetery and Capisic Pond had a slower start but this week we’ve been seeing around 18 species of warblers each day. One of our “dream birds” to find is a Golden-winged Warbler, an increasingly rare vagrant to Maine that breeds in the high elevations of the Appalachian Mountains and northern-central US, and one was found at Hinckley Park in South Portland on May 16th!

Sean Agrodnia located the bird early on Wednesday morning and reported it on eBird. Modern technology allows good news to travel fast so it didn’t take long for birders to descend (no, they didn’t “flock”) on this 40-acre park in search of the 0.3oz warbler.

I finally connected with the Golden-winged Warbler this morning (17 May) after our walk at Evergreen Cemetery. Rare birds are always provide fun places to reconnect with Maine’s birding community but my primary goal was to record the vocalizations of this bird. This species has a slightly more complex song than its closest relative the Blue-winged Warbler (an uncommon breeder in southern Maine) and the South Portland bird had a very plastic song, changing its rhythmic pattern with almost every song burst:

In July 2017, eBird introduced regional “illustrated checklists” which do a great job providing a visual of any species frequency of occurrence (in the form of a bar chart), as well as showing photos and audio for that species. One goal I have had is to fill in the gaps in Maine’s Illustrated Checklist sdfsd and my above recording is the first Golden-winged Warbler recording in Maine. You can try searching for various regions and see if there are any sightings or media that you can contribute! For example, have you ever photographed a Mourning Dove in Sagadahoc County? Can you use your phone to record a Bobolink in York County? Or take a look at Maine Bird Atlas maps and see if you can fill in a block with a nesting Eastern Phoebe.