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The Red Warbler: Mexico’s Little Red Queen
A bright red songbird that only sings on sunny mornings
© Bradley Hacker
Red Warblers only sing on sunny mornings during the breeding season — so hearing their song is as good as checking the weather forecast. Weighing less than a triple A battery, Red Warblers are endemic to the highlands of Mexico and live in humid forests of pine, oak, and fir.
Listen to this episode in Spanish here.
BirdNote®
The Red Warbler: Mexico’s Little Red Queen
Written by Paula Vilella
This is BirdNote.
[Red Warbler song]
If you know how to distinguish it, the song of the Red Warbler is enough to tell you whether the morning is clear. No need to get out of bed or check the weather forecast. During the breeding season, between February and May, they happily sing on sunny mornings. But if it's cloudy, they won’t sing –no matter the season.
[Abrupt fade-out]
So this is what a clear morning sounds like:
[Red Warbler song]
Red Warblers are the tiniest weather station you can imagine: barely 5 inches long and weighing less than a triple A battery.
[Red Warbler song]
They’re endemic to the highlands of Mexico, so to hear them, you have to venture into the humid forests of pine, oak, and fir. Although you can spot Red Warblers in a large part of the country's territory, they don’t travel between states.
[Red Warbler song]
When taking care of their offspring, both parents care for their chicks. But they approach their nests only for a few seconds to avoid attracting predators. It’s just one of their tricks for survival. Although there is evidence of a slight decline in their populations, it's not a drastic one. So hopefully we'll have our little weather stations around for a long time.
For BirdNote, I'm Lucina Melesio.
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Senior Producer: John Kessler
Producer: Mark Bramhill
Managing Editor: Jazzi Johnson
Managing Producer: Conor Gearin
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Red Warbler ML289316 recorded by Peter Boesman, Red Warbler ML559704961 recorded by Isain Contreras, and Red Warbler ML153847541 and ML153846261 recorded by Jay McGowan.
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2023 BirdNote November 2023
Narrator: Lucina Melesio
ID# REWA-01-2023-11-21 REWA-01
Reference:
http://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/wilson/v081n02/p0184-p…
http://datazone.birdlife.org/species/factsheet/22721888
Paula Vilella
Writer