On a recent evening visit to Otter View Park in Middlebury, I ran into a friend who told me they knew the location of a Warbling Vireo nest. They took me to where it was, and it couldn’t have been in a more convenient place to view it. Just off the main trail, in a Maple tree below a berm, putting the nest nearly at a reasonable height in relation to a viewer.

Being near sunset, there wasn’t much to see other than one of the parents sitting on the nest, likely settled in for the night, so I resolved to go back again in the morning when they were more active.

The next day, armed with a tripod-mounted camera, I set up to get some video of the Vieros, and was very pleased to catch some interesting behavior. First, there was an exchange of sitting duties between a female, and a male who had been singing nearly constantly from out of sight above the nest. The second, and most interesting thing I caught was that even while on the nest, the male wouldn’t stop it’s signing. You can view the embedded video on this page to see for yourself.

– Ron Payne

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