Released by the Great Florida Birding & Wildlife Trail —-
Warbler Neck: The neck strain you might experience after peering up through binoculars at birds in the treetops; named for warblers because of their habitat of perching and flitting about very high in trees.
Example: My friends don’t think that birding is a physically challenging hobby, but that’s just because they’ve never climbed a mountain for a rare high elevation species or been struck with a terrible case of warbler neck.
Vagrant: A stray bird showing up well outside of its normal range.
Example: Birders in south Florida are delighted when they find vagrant birds like La Sagra’s Flycatcher or Bananaquit that typically are only found in the West Indies.
Fallout: Don’t panic if you hear a birder use this term in the springtime! In the birding world, fallout refers to a weather event forcing birds to stop in large numbers during migration.
Example: I hear the fallout in the Keys has been incredible this year – people have been seeing 25 warbler species in one day!
A grammar bonus for all of you bird nerds who are also word nerds:
To capitalize or not to capitalize? Though common names of birds are not considered proper nouns by a general audience, many birders and ornithologists capitalize official common names.
Example: I can’t believe my English professor tried to correct my grammar when I wrote “Prothonotary Warbler.” She is clearly not a birder!