Alternate Adult male nearly unmistakable: yellow underparts are overlaid by thick black streaks converging into a necklace on the breast, upperparts are black with a white panel on wing coverts, undertail coverts are white, a black stripe through auriculars divides yellow throat from gray crown, and a thin white supercilium begins just above the eye. Basic Adult male has black streaks limited to flanks, two narrow white wingbars in place of white wing panel, and plain face with gray crown and yellow throat. Alternate Adult female resembles male, but with reduced streaking below, partly green back, reduced white in wing panel, and less black on face. Immatures nearly lack streaking entirely, lack black or white on the face, and have green back, two white wing bars, white eye ring, and a gray band across the lower throat. In flight, note yellow rump and white panels in tail.

Length: 13 (cm) Wingspan: 19 (cm)

Voice:

Thin, high, short, whistled phrases; similar to Chestnut-sided Warbler and American Redstart. Call is a single tsip note.

Habitat:

Breeds in small conifers, especially spruces and firs. In migration and winter, occurs in a wide variety of woodlands. The name derives from a specimen collected in a magnolia tree in Mississippi, far from its breeding range.

Behavior:

May be found at all levels in vegetation, rarely on the ground. Typically seen alone or in pairs, except in migration and winter, when it may join flocks of other warblers. Nest is a cup of grasses and other fibrous plant material placed on a horizontal conifer branch just a few feet off the ground.

Feeding:

Gleans foliage for insects and spiders. Also occasionally eats berries.