Species: Setophaga ruticilla

American Redstart
Species

    EGGS: Average size 16.2 x 12.3 mm. Oval to short-oval. Shell smooth, has slight gloss. White, grayish white, creamy white, greenish white; dotted, spotted, blotched with reddish-browns, grays; often concentrated at large end.

    Kingdom
    Animalia
    Phylum
    Craniata
    Class

    Aves

    Order

    Passeriformes

    Family

    Parulidae

    Genus

    Setophaga

    Classification
    Other Global Common Names
    Chipe Flameante - Mariquita-de-Rabo-Vermelho - paruline flamboyante
    Informal Taxonomy
    Animals, Vertebrates - Birds - Perching Birds
    Formal Taxonomy
    Animalia - Craniata - Aves - Passeriformes - Parulidae - Setophaga

    EGGS: Average size 16.2 x 12.3 mm. Oval to short-oval. Shell smooth, has slight gloss. White, grayish white, creamy white, greenish white; dotted, spotted, blotched with reddish-browns, grays; often concentrated at large end.

    Short General Description
    A 13-cm bird (warbler).
    Migration
    false - false - true - Arrives in Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands in September (sometimes as early as August), departs by April or as late as early May (Raffaele 1983). Begins arriving in Jamaica in late August, with main influx mid- to late September (Holmes et al. 1989). Migration in Costa Rica is from mid-August, rarely late July, through late October and April-early May (Stiles and Skutch 1989). Present in South America mostly September-April (Ridgely and Tudor 1989).
    Non-migrant
    false
    Locally Migrant
    false
    Food Comments
    Eats mostly forest tree insects, also spiders and some fruits and seeds (Terres 1980). In Jamaica in winter, takes almost all insect prey from air, usually within a few centimeters of vegetation (Lack 1976). Searches for insects below the canopy on trunks, limbs, twigs, and leaves, captures prey during aerial sallies (Bushman and Therres 1988, Stiles and Skutch 1989). In winter in Mexico, preferred foliage density is open; often hawks prey, also gleans and hovers (Rappole and Warner 1980). In mangroves in Venezuela, feeds on insects captured in foliage and in the air (Lefebvre et al. 1992). See Keast et al. (1995, Auk 112:310-325) for information on adaptations for aerial feeding.
    Reproduction Comments
    In the mid-Atlantic region, nesting occurs from late April to early July, with a peak from mid-May to mid-June (Bushman and Therres 1988). Clutch size is 1-5; clutch size declines over the summer, however, from 4 (occasionally 5) eggs in late May/early June to 3 (occasionally 1 or 2) eggs in July. Incubation, by female, lasts 11-13 days. Young are tended by both parents, leave nest at 8-9 days. Typically, there is only one brood, though females may renest up to three times when nests are lost (Sherry and Holmes 1994). Fledging success can be highly variable from year to year; for example, Sherry and Holmes (1992) reported a range of 0.2 to 0.7 at Hubbard Brook; causes of nest failures also varied annually, as did abundance and age structure of the population. The number of yearlings that return to breed appears dependent upon nest success the previous year; poor nesting success in the mid-1980s appears to have caused a decline in the total population during that period (Sherry and Holmes 1992).
    Ecology Comments
    BREEDING POPULATION DENSITY: Published information on bird densities from breeding bird censuses in the southeastern U.S. between 1947 and 1979 were summarized by Hamel et al. (1982). Mean (standard error) density was listed as 8.7 (2.8) pairs per 40 ha with a density range of 2.7-87 pairs per 40 ha. In northern New Hampshire (White Mountains), Sabo (1980) recorded average densities of 40 pairs per sq km in subalpine habitats, and 9 pairs per sq km in virgin spruce groves. Sherry and Holmes (1988) reported a range of 2.5-6.75 male territories on 10-ha sites at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest, New Hampshire. When population trends for the month of June (mid-breeding period) at Hubbard Brook were analyzed for the period 1969-1986, Holmes and Sherry (1988) found the mean (standard deviation) number of adult to be 28.67 (8.84) birds per 10 ha. In Maryland, Whitcomb et al. (1981) reported territorial densities to be 71 males per sq km. <br><br>Two studies of bottomland hardwood forests provide data from similar censusing techniques: Mitchell and Lancia (1990) found densities to be the highest in edge habitat (an average 0.14 birds per 25 m radius 10-min point count) in South Carolina. On the Roanoke River National Wildlife Refuge in North Carolina, R. Sallabanks (unpubl. data) found densities to be highest in the interior of wide levee forest patches (an average 0.57 birds per unlimited radius 10-min point count). Between 1986 and 1988, Sherry and Holmes (1989) found the number of yearling males to be low (0-1 males per 5 ha) compared with older males (6-8 males per 5 ha). <br><br>WINTERING POPULATIONS: Solitary in winter (Stiles and Skutch 1989). Defends winter territory (Jamaica, Holmes et al. 1989, Marra et al. 1993; Mexico, Rappole and Warner 1980); individuals commonly return to the same territory in successive years. Density in winter in Jamaica was 10-51 per 10 ha, comparable to breeding densities reported for eastern U.S., but greater than densities reported for other sites in the Caribbean and Mexico (0-17 per 10 ha) (Holmes et al. 1989; see also Bennett 1980). Winter densities were listed by Hamel et al. (1982) as a mean (standard error) of 2.5 (1.5) pairs per 40 ha with a density range of 1-4 pairs per 40 ha. <br><br>TERRITORY SIZE: Little information exists on territory size. Freemark and Merriam (1986) listed territory size as less than 2 ha near Ottawa, Canada. Based upon 14 birds, Sabo (1980) found territory size to be 0.6 ha. <br><br>COMPETITION: Several studies have addressed habitat selection and territory occupancy in response to both intra- and inter-specific competition (Ficken and Ficken 1967, Sherry 1979, Sherry and Holmes 1988, 1989, Secunda and Sherry 1991). In New Hampshire, Sherry and Holmes (1988) found the density of redstart territories to be slightly higher when a dominant competitor, the least flycatcher (EMPIDONAX MINIMUS), was absent (approximately 4.4 territories per 4 ha) than when present (approximately 4.0 territories per 4 ha). Least flycatchers locally excluded after second year redstarts from best patches of habitat within a heterogeneous array of such patches (Sherry and Holmes 1988). <br><br>MORTALITY FACTORS: Weather accounted for most nest losses during the building stage and caused starvation of nestlings in some years at Hubbard Brook (Sherry and Holmes 1994). Widespread starvation in 1984 was probably caused by a series of heavy rainstorms during the nestling period that depressed insect abundances, or reduced foraging time or success, or both (Sherry and Holmes 1992).
    Length
    13
    Weight
    9
    NatureServe Global Status Rank
    G5
    Global Status Last Reviewed
    1996-12-03
    Global Status Last Changed
    1996-12-03
    Other Status

    LC - Least concern

    Conservation Status Map
    <img src="http://www.natureserve.org/explorer/servlet/GetMapGif?CA.AB=S5&CA.BC=S5&CA.LB=S2&CA.MB=S5&CA.NB=S5&CA.NF=S5&CA.NT=S4&CA.NS=S5&CA.ON=S5&CA.PE=S5&CA.QC=S5&CA.SK=S5&CA.YT=S3&US.AL=S4&US.AK=S3&US.AZ=S1&US.AR=S3&US.CA=SNR&US.CO=S1&US.CT=S5&US.DE=S1&US.DC=S1&US.FL=S2&US.GA=S5&US.ID=S4&US.IL=S5&US.IN=S4&US.IA=S4&US.KS=S2&US.KY=S4&US.LA=S3&US.ME=S5&US.MD=S4&US.MA=S5&US.MI=S5&US.MN=SNR&US.MS=S5&US.MO=S4&US.MT=S5&US.NN=__&US.NE=S4&US.NH=S5&US.NJ=S4&US.NM=__&US.NY=S5&US.NC=S5&US.ND=SNR&US.OH=S5&US.OK=S3&US.OR=SU&US.PA=S5&US.RI=S5&US.SC=SNR&US.SD=S4&US.TN=S4&US.TX=S2&US.UT=SH&US.VT=S5&US.VA=S5&US.WA=S4&US.WV=S5&US.WI=S4&US.WY=S4" alt="Conservation Status Map" style="width: 475px; height: auto;" />
    Global Range
    H - >2,500,000 square km (greater than 1,000,000 square miles) - H - BREEDING: southern Alaska and southern Yukon across Canada to southern Labrador and Newfoundland, south to eastern Oregon, northwestern California, Idaho, northern Utah, east-central Arizona, eastern Oklahoma, eastern Texas, northern Gulf Coast, the Carolinas, and southern Virginia. Absent from most of the Great Plains (AOU 1983). NON-BREEDING: extremely widespread, in Mexico along both coasts, on the Pacific from southern Baja California and Sinaloa south and on the Atlantic from southern Texas (rarely) and more typically from Veracruz and Yucatan peninsula south; less common in highlands. Common throughout the West Indies (Pashley 1988, Pashley 1988, Pashley and Hamilton 1990) and Central America. In South America, common in Colombia and Venezuela east into Guyana and Suriname, south through Ecuador, rarely into Peru and northwestern Brazil; Trinidad and Tobago (Sibley and Monroe 1990).
    Global Range Code
    H
    Global Range Description
    >2,500,000 square km (greater than 1,000,000 square miles)
    ELEMENT_GLOBAL.2.101347