Birders

Donkees

(31,496 posts) Sun Apr 21, 2024, 01:05 PM Apr 21

A Megawatt of Bird: Prothonotary Warbler - Prospect Park, Brooklyn, NYC

David Lei

''The brilliant Prothonotary Warbler bounces along branches like a golden flashlight in the dim understory of swampy woodlands. This golden ray of light is unique among warblers with its beady black eye and blue-gray wings. It is also one of two warblers that build their nests in holes in standing dead trees. Often called a "swamp warbler" in the southeast, it also occurs surprisingly far to the north along rivers. Its population is declining, due to loss of forested wetlands in the U.S. and mangroves on its wintering grounds.

The Prothonotary Warbler got its name from the bright yellow robes worn by papal clerks, known as prothonotaries, in the Roman Catholic church.

The Prothonotary Warbler had its day in court during the Cold War. In 1948 Alger Hiss an American government official was accused of being a soviet spy. Part of the trial hinged on whether Hiss knew Whittaker Chambers, a former member of the U.S. Communist Party. Chambers claimed that he talked to Hiss about watching birds and reported Hiss's excitement about seeing a Prothonotary Warbler on the Potomac River. This bird sighting linked the two people and eventually led to Hiss's sentence and to the rise of Richard Nixon to political power.''

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Prothonotary_Warbler/overview