vireo

plural vireos · plural vireoes

1. Any of a number of small insectivorous passerine birds, of the genus Vireo, that have grey-green plumage.

   2012, Eloise Potter, Birds of the Carolinas, Easyread Large Edition, page 94, This is our only vireo that has two white wing bars, yellow spectacles, and yellow sides.

   2 more examples

   The voices of male vireos are a constant in the spring woodland, providing background music to the longer, prettier songs of tanagers and thrushes. Vireos tend to sing in bursts interrupted by short or long pauses.

   1998, Sally Roth, Attracting Birds to Your Backyard, page 257

   Uniquely American, the vireos are a group of some 46 foliage-gleaning forest birds with uncertain family connections. Vireo species are about equally divided between North and South America, with one, the Black-whiskered Vireo, largely restricted to the West Indies. Several vireos make long migratory journeys; all are nocturnal migrants.

   2007, Jonathan Elphick, The Atlas of Bird Migration: Tracing the Great Journeys of the World's Birds, page 72

2. Any bird of the family Vireonidae, which includes vireos, shrike-vireos, greenlets, and peppershrikes.

   Family Vireonidae Vireos The vireos are slim grayish green birds that stay high up in the trees most of the time.

   1950, Ernest Sheldon Booth, Birds of the West, page 282