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It’s in Your Nature: Every female crazy ’bout a sharp-dressed male

Published April 06. 2024 09:00AM

In the next four or five weeks, my Carbon County bird list will swell from 60 to about 150 or more birds. The tropics have held our warblers, tanagers, flycatchers, etc., through winter and they are on the move northward. But as they begin departing, or just before leaving the wintering areas, they will undergo another molt. Birds usually molt twice a year. All birds molt to replace damaged and in particular, worn feathers. But building new feathers does take a “bunch of energy” so it usually only happens twice.

The beautiful colored warblers or the scarlet tanagers lost their brilliant colors late last summer and many of us wouldn’t recognize them if you found, let’s say, a chestnut-sided warbler, in Amazonia in January. Many male birds use sexual dichromatism (males brighter than females) in one of its efforts to attract a mate to its territory. Of course, if you open your windows at daybreak, you know that the robins also use their never-ending songs to attract mates and to tell other possible suitors that your backyard is already claimed.

Today’s column is designed to show you some of the drastic plumage changes that many males use.

It may surprise you that in many instances, such as a scarlet tanager, they only keep their breeding plumage for about 5 months of the year. I’m conjecturing that a brilliantly red feathered tanager is a very noticeable target in the forest, compared to the duller green colors it has for much of the year. Many male ducks also don a breeding plumage beginning in late winter and then again by autumn have a less gaudy look. I hope the photos remind you of how much many birds’ appearances do change.

But, to see them showing off, get out there.

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: Besides the Baltimore oriole, what other oriole species nests in the Times News region? A. Audubon’s oriole; B. orchard oriole; C. Bullock’s oriole.

Last Week’s Trivia Answer: It is true, no gull species nest in Carbon County.

Email Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com

In May, a male rose-breasted grosbeak shows off his beautiful breeding plumage. BARRY REED PHOTOS
In mid-September, the male grosbeak has transformed into a much more dull “outfit.”
The yellow-rumped warbler, one of the earliest warblers to return each spring, displays some bright yellow feathers on its body, and its rump as well.
Quite a change from late April, an October photo shows a dull, winter version of a yellow-rumped warbler.
If you are still feeding your backyard birds, the American goldfinch male is just transitioning from the winter to the summer breeding plumage.
From mid-April until early autumn, the male goldfinch “wears” his familiar colors.
Male goldfinches sport their winter plumage from late September through March.
I've seen hundreds of male scarlet tanagers and each one, in my opinion, is one of the “best dressed” songbirds. Remember that they have their breeding plumage from mid-April until mid to late August.
I found this male scarlet tanager in its transition from its brilliant plumage to the duller winter plumage.
The transition is complete! Fall birding led me to this scarlet tanager in its non-breeding feathers in late September.
This horned grebe displays its breeding plumage when I photographed it at Beltzville Lake one late March morning.
Much of the year, from late summer until the next spring, the horned grebe dons a more subdued look; its non-breeding plumage.