Townsend's Warbler Archives - Window to Wildlife

I made the trip up to Kewaunee this morning with hopes to see the very rare visitor to Wisconsin, the Townsend’s Warbler. It has been visiting a feeder in a yard there for at least a week now. It is not seen often but visits daily. This bird is a 1st year female. The host Pam S. has many feeders in her yard and this is one of the places this bird visits. I say that as her sister lives 5 blocks away, this bird also visits her feeder too, along with many feeders that can be seen looking up and down the street. A small group of us showed up at the start of the day today which visitors are not allowed till 10:00 am thru 4:00 pm. Surprisingly the bird had stopped in the early morning but showed briefly at about 10:05 am. We all got looks, but images were a different story with his brief visit. Most left but Jay W and I hung around till noon. As I started heading to my car about 12:02, Jay yelled, it is back. We both got nice views and a few shots as it took a drink at the heated bird bath in the yard. This bird has been eating seeds at the feeders. The visit was brief again, we thought it headed up into a large spruce tree on the property. We were both happy with what we got, very cold and headed out. I heard this was the 6th Wisconsin state record for this species, a western bird far from it’s normal range of the north American west coast. What a stunning bird! A big thank you to Pam S. for sharing this amazing bird with the birding community. With very cold temps coming in the state and a big snow blanket coming along with that it will be interesting to see how long it hangs around. An awesome life bird that I just did not think I would be getting anytime soon, but as birding goes, one never really knows. Weather was high in the mid 20’s, some sun with clouds and a lot of north wind, very cold! If visiting for this bird, Pam asks that you view from the driveway. Images were taken on December 9, 2016.