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white-eyed vireo
white-eyed vireo (Vireo griseus)
Photo © Alan Murphy Photography
Features and Behaviors
FEATURES
The white-eyed vireo is five inches long. The yellow coloration at the top of the bill continues to form a ring around each eye. The throat feathers are white, and there are two, white wing bars. Yellow feathers are present on the sides of the belly. The eye is white in the adult and dark in immature white-eyed vireos.
BEHAVIORS
Spring migrants begin arriving in Illinois in early April. Their nest is built in a cup shape and placed in a fork in a tree branch close to the ground. A typical clutch has four eggs. Nests are often parasitized by the brown-headed cowbird. The white-eyed vireo overwinters from the Gulf Coast states south to Central America and some of the Caribbean islands. It eats insects and fruits.
Illinois Range
Taxonomy
Kingdom: Animalia
Phylum: Chordata
Class: Aves
Order: Passeriformes
Family: Vireonidae
Illinois Status: common, native
