About This Bibliography
This bibliography includes approximately 300 references related to the willow flycatcher, with an emphasis on the southwestern subspecies. It contains a broad mix of references from peer-reviewed journals, government agency surveys and reports, and non-government agency and consulting firm documents. Our literature search concentrated on unpublished gray literature, historical records and publications, and those references with direct management implications. Although primarily a bibliography for E.t. extimus, literature dealing with other subspecies has been included if it provided useful comparative data. The bibliography is, to the best of our knowledge, comprehensive through 1996.
The database does not include popular articles, newspaper articles or editorials, museum holding lists, simple species checklists for an area, computer databases, or map products. In addition, we generally did not include materials with only a brief or passing reference to the Willow Flycatcher and/or that summarized, rather than synthesized, information available in other sources. Annotations were designed to aid the investigator in determining which documents they may wish to read or acquire, rather than to fully summarize or present the results of the document.
Taxonomic and nomenclatural history presents a challenge in locating and presenting information on the willow flycatcher. What we now call the Willow Flycatcher has gone by various names including (but not limited to) the Little Flycatcher (Empidonax pusillus), Traill’s Flycatcher (Empidonax traillii), and Western Traill’s or Brewster’s Flycatcher (Empidonax traillii brewsteri). It was only recently that many references treated the Willow Flycatcher as separate from its sibling species the Alder Flycatcher (Empidonax alnorum), rather than treating them together as Traill’s Flycatcher. This can cause a great deal of confusion, particularly in those references and geographic locations which could include both the Willow and Alder flycatchers. Where references include these older or more obscure names, the bibliographic annotation provides the common and scientific names given at time by the author(s).
The Colorado Plateau Research Station is not a repository for these documents, and so can not provide them if requested. Documents should be sought from their original sources (e.g., author, agency, library, or publisher).
This bibliography was developed by the U.S. Geological Survey Colorado Plateau Research Station at Northern Arizona University, and owes its genesis to the Arizona Partners in Flight avian reference database compiled by Rob Marshall. Funding was provided by the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation (Phoenix, AZ) and the U.S. Geological Survey Biological Resources Division. We hope that this bibliography serves as a valuable tool to future management, conservation, and research on this subspecies.
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