Setophaga fusca
Silhouette: Dylan GE Gomes · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10%
The Blackburnian warbler (Setophaga fusca) is a small New World warbler. They breed in eastern North America, from southern Canada, westwards to the southern Canadian Prairies, the Great Lakes region and New England, to North Carolina. They are migratory, wintering in southern Central America and South America, and are very rare vagrants to western Europe. The common name honors the English botanist Anna Blackburne.
The Blackburnian warbler was formally described in 1776 by the German zoologist Philipp Statius Müller under the binomial name Motacilla fusca. The specific epithet is Latin meaning "dusky", "black" or "brown". Müller based his account on a handcoloured plate of the "Figuier étranger" that had been engraved by François-Nicolas Martinet to accompany the Comte de Buffon's multivolume work Histoire Naturelle des Oiseaux. The type location is French Guiana. The Blackburnian warbler is now placed in the genus Setophaga that was introduced by the English naturalist William Swainson in 1827. The genus name Setophaga combines the Ancient Greek σης/sēs, σητος/sētos meaning "moth" with -φαγος/-phagos meaning "-eating". The species is monotypic: no subspecies are recognised... Wikipedia →
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ralph Perkins II Wildlife Center and Woods Garden | 🇺🇸 United States |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Blackburnian Warbler sighting in Houston on a given day, based on 506 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 144th most-seen of the 302 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, if each day is a fresh chance.
April and May
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Blackburnian Warbler in Houston on a given day, against under 5% in June to March, the lowest months.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Blackburnian Warbler sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
11th of 33
Of the 33 cities where we can rate Blackburnian Warbler sightings, Houston ranks 11th at under 5%. The best odds are in Bogota (Colombia, about 20%), Quito (Ecuador, about 20%) and Medellín (Colombia, about 10%).
Same genus: Setophaga
The closest relatives of the Blackburnian Warbler that you can see in Houston (genus Setophaga, Setophaga Warblers) are Yellow-rumped Warbler (about 40%), Pine Warbler (about 20%) and Northern Yellow Warbler (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Blackburnian Warbler is recorded against all the birds logged in Houston (506 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
