methods

We wrote the color of each plumage feature in the table and we used “1” and “0” for traits that didn’t specify a color. The presence of wing bars, yellow feathers, bright colored feathers, more than two feather colors, and a matching crown were indicated by a 1 for yes and a 0 indicated no. A short beak was categorized by a 0 and a long beak was categorized by a 1. After evaluating each of the 33 species of Warblers for the set of characteristics determined, four of the patterns were chosen to apply to a phylogenetic tree. We choose the presence of wingbars, the presence of yellow feathers, foot coloration, and the presence of a matching crown color. We indicated the absence of wing bars with a black line on the taxa of the phylogenetic tree. On a new tree we indicated the absence of yellow feathers with a black line on the taxa of the phylogenetic tree. On another new tree, we marked the taxa of species that had a different color crown that the rest of the back with a black line. On a fourth tree, we indicated the color of the feet by using a different color line on each taxa that matches the color of the birds feet. Using the phylogenetic analysis, the characteristics were analyzed to determine any clear patterns of evolution and gene succession.