Tennessee warbler

American  

noun

1. a North American wood warbler, Vermivora peregrina, having a gray head, a greenish back, and white underparts.

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Etymology

Origin of Tennessee warbler

An Americanism dating back to 1805–15

Example Sentences

On Tuesday morning he had been excited to see a Tennessee warbler, a difficult-to-spot bird with “a really distinctive, urgent cry” that he said sounds in part like “a machine gun.”

From New York Times • May 17, 2022

Like a Tennessee warbler, the electric guitar flutters downward in graceful slides and turns.

From Time Magazine Archive

What an enigma the Tennessee warbler for a long time remained to me!

From Our Bird Comrades by Keyser, Leander S. (Leander Sylvester)

The American red-start comes to our very feet, the yellow warbler, the Tennessee warbler, the red-eyed vireo, and the magnolia warbler, which last, a young Cree tells us, is "High-Chief-of-all-the-small-birds."

From The New North by Cameron, Agnes Deans

The Ipswich sparrow was the third such bird that I had seen during the year without going out of New England, the other two being the Tennessee warbler and the Philadelphia vireo.

From A Rambler's lease by Torrey, Bradford