Over Thanksgiving I had the chance to visit family in Lakeland and took a nice stroll with camera around Hancock Lake at the Circle B Bar Ranch. I photographed this warbler (?) and am having trouble ID'ing it. Is it the Florida version of a Yellow Warbler - first winter female? Or a Blue Gray Gnatcatcher? Or something else?
It's a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. In addition to having the right color, shape, bill, and eyering, take a look at the tail. Your photo clearly shows the dark tail with white outer tail feathers.
Of course they hop and flit like crazy, so they do act a lot like warblers, but it's a smaller and slimmer bird. If I recall correctly, it's actually in the family of Old World warblers.
The upper level taxonomy is not quite settled in this portion of the avian phylogenetic tree but FWIW, gnatcatchers are in their own family Polioptilidae (well, along with gnatwrens). At one time they were thought to be aligned with Old World Warblers but current data points to a closer relationship with wrens.
Many thanks. I was not seeing similar behaviors to what I was used to in California and the eye ring seemed stronger than i thought. Thanks for the ID help!