What bird says here I am, where are you?

The bird asking here I am, where are you? is a Red-eyed Vireo, a small olive songbird that stays hidden in the leafy treetops of woods, parks and shady suburbs from spring through summer. It sings short phrases of two to four syllables, one tipping up like a question and the next tipping down like an answer, and it keeps going all day, even on hot afternoons when most birds have gone quiet. The American Robin sings similar caroling phrases, and the Warbling Vireo sings in the same kinds of places over the same months.

Listen: the likeliest bird

Writer and environmental educator David A. Greenwood, in an essay for the Center for Humans and Nature, calls Here I am! Where are you? a common mnemonic for this bird's song, one of the first he learned by ear. What it captures, he writes, is a short rising and falling of tones, closer to chirping speech than music. The field guides say the same without the words. Audubon describes short, monotonous phrases, as if the bird were endlessly asking and answering the same question. The Missouri Department of Conservation describes two-, three- or four-syllable whistles, with phrases that alternately slur up and slur down.

That question-and-answer pattern is the key. Each phrase is brief, with a little gap before the next, and the direction keeps flipping. The words will not match every phrase, because a male sings thirty or more song types a day, Greenwood notes, but the rhythm stays the same. It also explains an old nickname: the Missouri guide says the bird has been called the preacher bird for its endless orations, rising as if asking a question and falling as if giving the answer.

The bird that sings all day

Most songbirds sing hardest at dawn and then ease off. This one does not. Audubon notes that the male sings persistently throughout the day in the breeding season, even on hot summer afternoons. On a hot, humid afternoon in an Ozark forest, the Missouri guide says, it may be the only bird still calling apart from Indigo Buntings. Greenwood cites a 1952 count of one male that sang 22,147 songs between before dawn and evening.

Audubon calls it one of the most numerous summer birds in eastern woods, but not one of the most often seen, because it stays up in the leafy treetops, searching the foliage slowly for insects. It breeds in deciduous and mixed forest and in well-wooded suburbs, orchards and parks. In Missouri it is a common summer resident from April through September, and the whole population winters in South America.

If you do get a look, check the head: a gray crown, a white eyebrow with a black stripe above it and a black line through the eye. The red eye that gives the bird its name is hard to see, and young birds have brown eyes.

Other birds that sound like it

Audubon says the vireo's phrases sound like an American Robin, and the Missouri guide compares the song to a robin's aimless warbling, with a brighter tone and more space between phrases. If the phrases come close together and roll along, think robin, the bird that sings cheer up, cheerily. If each phrase stands alone after a beat of silence, from a bird you cannot find, think vireo.

The Warbling Vireo, now often listed as the Eastern Warbling Vireo, is a drab bird with a brilliant song. The Missouri guide describes a melodious series of rapid, bubbling notes, about three to five seconds long, that rise and fall throughout and often end on a high note, and compares it to the opening flourishes of Chopin's Fantaisie-Impromptu. It favors large trees near water. Where the red-eye speaks in short sentences, the warbling vireo says everything in one breath.

Two less familiar vireos also sing similar songs. The Missouri guide says the Yellow-throated Vireo has a similar song given at longer intervals and less clearly whistled, and the Philadelphia Vireo's is slightly higher and less emphatic, with longer pauses.

How to tell which one you heard

• Short phrases with a gap after each, alternating up and down, hour after hour: Red-eyed Vireo.
• One long, bubbling warble that ends high: Warbling Vireo.
• Caroling phrases that run together, with a less bright tone: American Robin.
• The same pattern but slower, with longer pauses: consider the Yellow-throated or Philadelphia Vireo.
• Check the clock: a tireless singer in the treetops on a hot afternoon is very likely the Red-eyed Vireo.
• If you see it: the Red-eyed has a black line above its white eyebrow. The Warbling Vireo lacks it and has only an indistinct gray eye line.

If the preacher stays hidden in the leaves, Warble can listen and name him from the song alone.

Questions people ask

Warble is a game, not a field guide. Facts about birds on this page come from the sources above.