Has Dale Forbes Possibly Come to His Senses About American Warblers?

 

  In previous articles by Dale Forbes, he argued that American warblers aren't 'true' warblers. He didn't go unchallenged. I argued back that 'American Warblers Are REAL Warblers'. I then found another article by him entitled: '7 Reasons Why I Hate Wood Warblers'. This did not go unchallenged, either (of course). Now I have found yet another article by him: http: 'Okay, Okay, Wood Warblers Are the Bomb'. This article is not going to argued about (at least not much).

 

  Forbes starts out his article by saying:

"Last year 10,000 Birds celebrated Wood Warbler Week, which gave me an opportunity to describe exactly what a Wood Warbler (aka Phylloscopus sibilatrix) really was. And to inform North Americans that their so-called wood warblers would be more aptly named Silly-Canaries. Despite fairly convincing arguments, it seems the entire North American ornithological community has completely ignored all logic and we have yet to see any major changes in naming logic."

 

 He still seems to think that they are not 'true' wood warblers, even though they are certainly 'true' wood warblers.

Once he changes that opinion, he may be rightly called a respected bird blogger (as I have said many times in the past two articles, and now this one, even though our warblers are better looking than yours, that doesn't mean they aren't warblers).

 

 He goes on to say:

"This May saw a dramatic change in my life as a birder. One might even go as far as to say it was a turning point – a point to measure and assess my life – before and after The Biggest Week in American Birding.'

 'My first morning at Magee Marsh and the Biggest Week in American Birding was absolutely incredible. At least as good as all the warblers were the crowds of birders. Everywhere I went there were people loving the birds and hanging out with other birders. And I found the people incredibly polite, friendly and helpful. Now, I really wasn’t expecting that as crowds of people are normally rather pushy and I tend to be a small group or solitary birder – avoiding the crowds and talking. But this was an absolute spectacle.'

'It would be hard to deny the beauty of the incredible burning Blackburnian Warbler (Setophaga fusca)."

 

  Ok. He has at least admitted that he has had a turning point in his life as a birder, and that it would be hard to deny that our warblers are beautiful.

After writing a few article bashing our warblers, this is impressive. At the end of one of your articles saying why you hate our warblers, I knew a change was coming about when he admitted that he was jealous of our warblers.

 

"The Myrtle Yellow-rumped Warblers (Setophaga coronata coronata) are said to be the most abundant warbler at Magee Marsh in the spring migration, and we certainly did see lots of them. But I never got remotely bored with them.'

'But my personal favorite of all the wood-warblers I saw during the Biggest Week were the Magnolia Warblers (Setophaga magnolia). Relatively common, beautifully coloured and with wonderful personalities. I also liked their distinctive black and white tails.'

'On seeing my first Hooded Warbler (Setophaga citrina), I took a few digiscoping snapshots and as I was starting to move off I told someone about it and they almost freaked out: where? where? where? Funny how contextual birds are, I just had no idea that this would be something special there. It was just another of the dozens of incredible warblers about.'

'Well, the Palm Warbler (Setophaga palmarum) might not have much to compete with a Blackburnian, but I grew to really like them.'

'The thing that surprised me the most when walking through the boardwalk was the abundance and variety of gaudiness, both in the birds and people. Everywhere I looked, there was a bird even more brightly coloured and interesting. The same went for the people."

 

  Has he changed his mind about our warblers? Time will tell. I still have to investigate another article of his about our warblers. Look for the fourth article in the Warbler Wars series coming soon on Birds of Ohio.webnode.com

 

 

READ HIS FULL ARTICLE AT:

https://10000birds.com/wood-warblers-biggest-week.htm

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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