I love rare birds from odd places, and found in odd places (maybe not so odd as the habitat looks good, just the location isn’t oft birded).
Why would this bird stop in this location? Well, looks like weather is an easy culprit this time.
The green circle in that link is the location of the Red-faced Warbler sighting.
You can see the winds are from the south in NM where this bird can be seen at times and in certain habitats. You may also see a boundary where the winds are deforming to the east of the green circle (contracting in the north-south direction and pulling apart in the SE to NW direction). This boundary can be extrapolated westward to just north of where this bird was found. Those boundaries are often good places to go look for birds, and it panned out yesterday for those in the area lucky enough to chase it.
In Spring, may the deformation/boundary be just to your north!
Bryan
-- Bryan Guarente
Meteorologist/Instructional Designer
UCAR/The COMET Program
Boulder, CO