Olive-Sided Flycatcher
Contopus cooperi
Also known as: Olive-Side Flycatcher, Boreal Pewee
About This Species
Look for a stocky, big-headed bird perched bolt upright on the very tip of a dead snag or spire-top conifer, a favoured lookout for sallying out after flying insects and returning to the same perch. It favours boreal and montane forest edges, burns and bog margins with scattered standing dead wood. The clearest giveaway is the emphatic, whistled song, often rendered as sounding like a quick order for three drinks, delivered from these exposed perches through the short breeding season in late spring and early summer.
Ethical Viewing Guidelines
- Stay back and let it use its habitual perch rather than approaching the snag it favours, since repeated flushing from a lookout can cost it feeding opportunities during a short breeding window.
- Wild bird protections differ across its range, spanning breeding grounds in North America and wintering areas in the Andes, so check the rules that apply locally rather than assuming one country's protections cover the whole journey.
- If you are unsure of specific setback distances, keep well back and give it room to return to its perch undisturbed.
Seasonal Activity
509,108 sightings · 2000–2026
Citizen science records via GBIF
Classification
- Kingdom
- Animalia
- Phylum
- Chordata
- Class
- Aves
- Order
- Passeriformes
- Family
- Tyrannidae
Photo
(c) Ad Konings, some rights reserved (CC BY-NC), uploaded by Ad Konings
CC-BY-NC-4.0
Occurrence data from GBIF.