I need help with this bird: it is similar to a common yellowthroat -it has a yellow belly and a black mask- but the yellow is less like a goldfinch & more like a schoolbus yellow; it's beak is similar to a cardinal's shape, and it's face is black all the way around the tops of it's eyes and below the beak. The yellow belly goes up it's neck and then goes up the sides of it's head. It's crown, back and wings are brown streaked (like a sparrow). It is about the size of a cardinal. There is no white on it. I have spied him through binoculars for a long time, but do not have lens strong enough to get a good photo.
It has been hanging around the past two evenings in a pussywillow tree at the edge of a large pond; we live near the Atlantic Ocean, too, in Newport, Rhode Island. It has not come near our bird feeders.
I'm guessing it might be some sort of oriole, but the ones that I've found in my books all have too much black down the neck or are too orange. It looks like a sparrow with a cardinal's black beak (but the eyes and chin are black too) and has a sunflower yellow breast that goes up in a chin strap like a Canada Goose. I can't find anything like it in any of my books or on the internet!
