Voice of the Wild

This is Illinois Extension’s Voice of the Wild. Our birdsong will start in five seconds, so find someplace quiet, take a deep breath, and enjoy.

This bird forages at the top of the canopy, so it can be hard to spot. Luckily, it's easy to hear; it calls with gusto, often ending an ascending trill with a loud hiccup. But Getting a close look at the bird is worth the effort; It's among the most ostentatious of our migratory warblers. A blue head and back, bright wingbars, yellow under the bill, and a partial eyering that puts a white dot above and below each eye. Males even have a dark band across on their front, sometimes with a bit of orange in it. It's an absolute mess of color and a joy to behold. This is the Northern parula, Setophaga americana from the family of wood warblers, Parulidae. Here’s that ascending song again.

Thank you to the Macaulay library at the Cornell lab of Ornithology for our bird sounds. And thank you for tuning in to learn a new bird call with Illinois Extension.