A familiar voice in the deciduous forest, the Ovenbird announces itself with one of the most emphatic songs in North America — the rising, repeated Teacher…Teacher…Teacher of a breeding male, often ringing out well into the season long after other birds have gone quiet.
There are an estimated 26 million Ovenbirds in the world, all living and migrating within the Western Hemisphere. Just six inches long and three-quarters of an ounce, this warbler breeds across an enormous range — from eastern British Columbia to Newfoundland, across the northeastern US and west to Montana, and south through the Appalachians to North Carolina and Virginia. In winter it retreats to Mexico, Central America, southern Florida, and the Caribbean.
Ovenbirds require relatively mature, large, contiguous tracts of deciduous or mixed forest. Fragmented habitat increases nest predation and brood parasitism, so the species' long-term success depends on the continued protection of core forest areas — the Ozarks, Appalachia, Pennsylvania, New England, and the great forests of Quebec and Ontario. On their wintering grounds, Ovenbirds use a variety of forest types including shade coffee, mangrove, and montane-pine, but are notably absent from sun coffee and open pasture.
The Ovenbird and its roughly 100 fellow wood warbler species evolved from dinosaurs an estimated 5 to 10 million years ago. You can support their future by backing organizations that protect forest lands — the Adirondack Land Trust, Merck Forest and Farm, Forestry for Maine Birds, and Audubon's Bird Friendly Maple Syrup program — and by choosing shade-grown coffee that keeps the wintering habitat intact.
Nearly a century ago, Robert Frost heard what we still hear today.
There is a singer everyone has heard,
Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird..
We'll be able to sing along with the Ovenbird as long as we care for the earth we all share.
AND DONT FORGET TO KEEP BUYING BIRD FRIENDLY BIRDS AND BEANS COFFEE