a good new warbler (& a thrush)

Continued gusts of wind from the northeast suggested lingering effects of Jose but the sky was blue and -- probably because of the winds -- there was not a drop of dew. There were birds around but these conditions made them hard to see. A few of the birds that went missing during the storm conditions were back including Gray Catbirds, House Finches and Red-winged Blackbirds. They were probably just hunkering down. But there were new birds. One of the newbies -- a bird I haven't seen around here in quite a few years (it used to be regular) -- was a Swainson's Thrush. Always a pleasure! An even more unusual visitor was a YELLOW-THROATED WARBLER, a southern species (it has only recently started nesting on Long Island) with a sharply defined bright yellow throat and upper breast, white below and a complicated face pattern consisting of an eye stripe, a lower half eye ring and a white patch behind the eye. We have had brief visits from one or two singing birds in the spring many years ago and a fall bird in the first week of September, 2007. The late September appearance up here of this beauty of a southern bird -- which should be migrating even further south by now -- might well be connected with Jose! Eric Salzman