Icterine warbler

Description

Icterine warblers are quite small, slender songbirds with rather large heads, quite strong beaks, long wings and relatively short tails. They are quite strikingly coloured compared to other tree warblers, with a brownish olive-green upperparts and a pale yellow underpart when freshly plumaged, but otherwise, like all warblers, they do not show any conspicuous markings. The sexes do not differ in size and colouration.

With a body length of 12.0 to 13.5 cm and a weight of 11 to 19 g, the species is clearly smaller than a house sparrow and only about half as heavy. In adult birds, the entire upperparts of the rump as well as the neck and head are a brownish olive-green. The wing region, the short over-eye stripe and the eye area are pale yellow. The middle coverts are dark brown, the greater coverts olive brown. The wings are blackish brown, the primaries and the tertials show narrow, the secondaries broader yellowish fringes on the outer vanes and yellowish tips. The tail feathers are dark brown with very narrow lighter brown edges. The entire underpart of the rump, the underwing coverts as well as the undertail coverts are pale yellow, the more intense yellow colouring often being restricted to the throat and forechest. Breast sides and flanks show a brownish tinge.

The iris is dark brown. The beak is clearly bicoloured; the upper beak is dark brown, the entire lower beak yellowish. The legs are leaden grey.

In juvenile plumage the upperparts are more brown-grey and less olive, the underparts paler yellow with more extensive brown flanks. The wings, tail feathers and the coverts have warm brownish edges.

The icterine warbler inhabits a wide range of habitats with loose trees and higher shrubbery, preferring multi-layered deciduous woods with a low degree of cover in the upper layer. In Central Europe, the species inhabits riparian forests and damp mixed deciduous forests, but also copses, hedgerows, cemeteries and semi-natural parks.

The text is a translation of an excerpt from Wikipedia (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gelbspötter). On wikipedia the text is available under a „Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike“ licence. Status: 17 November 2021