One evening last week I was looking up into the trees for any migrating birds. At first I thought I spotted an American Redstart because the bird kept flicking his tail around as redstarts often do. I snapped a few photos, but the bird was 40 feet above my head so I really couldn’t see what I was photographing.
It wasn’t until I downloaded the photos that I discovered that it was definitely not an American Redstart. The bird resembled an Eastern Phoebe with its gray head, but my bird was very small like a wren. Then I saw this photo:
Phoebes do not have an eye ring and as you can see this bird has a very distinct white eye ring. I was at a loss so I started flipping through my bird books until I found a match.
This little ball of energy is a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher and they are quite common across a good portion of the United States. I’ve never heard of one much less seen one before. They flit from branch to branch flicking their tails to stir up insects. Then they fly out and snatch them in mid air.
