Bay-breasted Warbler in fall plumage, October 30, 2015, Fresh Pond Reservation, Cambridge, MA. (c) DE Wolf 2015.

The duck migrating through Fresh Pond is the “big” story but there is also a “smaller” story.  These are the warblers passing through Massachusetts for a second time and headed South. Figure 1 shows a Bay-breasted Warbler – Setophaga castanea. This is a small, sweet looking bird if I may anthropomorphize, and its fall plumage nondescript, but its journey is monumental. It winters with the tourists in the Caribbean, in Colombia, and Venezuela.

At this time of year particularly with the females and juveniles it is hard to distinguish the bay breasted from similar warblers. But in the end I has identified, possibly misidentified it as a Bay-breasted. The black feet rules out the Black Poll Warbler and after examine other shots that I got I see faint striping on the birds back, which in turn rules out the Pine Warbler.

Warblers are fun. If you are not paying attention they are easily mistaken for sparrows. But their behavior is different and they tend to pause long enough and get close enough that if you are quick you can get a few photographs. On the small size is always a challenge. Here I got the eyes nicely in focus which is always the goal.

Canon T2i with EF70-200mm f/4L USM lens at 200 mm, ISO 1600, Aperture Priority AE mode, 1/1600 sec at f/7.1 with + 1 exposure compensation.