The Gray Catbirds have returned! I didn’t see a single one on Saturday, when I was scouting out species with a vengeance. On Wednesday, the next time I was in Green-Wood, I saw them in clumps of half a dozen each. Spring’s southern winds come raining catbirds.
Dumetella carolinensis, a study in gray. Then, surprisingly, they have a brick red vent. It’s hard to see this. It’s just barely glimpsed under the tail in these pictures.
Perched on Trifoliate Orange (Citrus trifoliata), a spiny thicket of an exotic ornamental with inch long spines. The bird’s genus name Dumetella means “small thicket,” so apropos.
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This work by Matthew Wills is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.
Backyard and Beyond 
silly me, I thought Catbirds had a chair.
you know, “sitting in the Catbird seat?”