Grace's Warbler

About the Grace's Warbler

A trim warbler of the western pines, Grace's Warbler is gray above and white below with a bright yellow throat and chest, a yellow eyebrow stripe, and black streaks along the sides. Named by the ornithologist Elliott Coues for his sister, it is a bird you are far more likely to hear than to spot, high in the canopy.

Grace's Warblers forage in the tops of tall pines, gleaning insects among the needles, and sing a trilling, accelerating song from the high branches.

In Texas they are warm-season breeders of the pine-clad mountains of the Trans-Pecos, such as the Davis Mountains, arriving in spring to the tall conifer forests and heading south by fall.

A note from behind the lens: high-canopy pine birds are among the hardest to photograph - expect to shoot steeply upward. Find a singing male working a favored group of pines, wait for him to move to a lower or outer branch, and use light coming through the needles to lift that yellow throat.