Spring: Birds!

Spring is officially here and so are the birds. I awoke this morning to the sight of a a blue jay, cyanocitta cristata, and a male northern cardinal, cardinalis cardinalis, sharing the branches of my still naked yoshino cherry. The jay would flit to the ground in search of insects and then back up into the tree.

When the cardinal grew tired of it,--and not seeing what it was he was looking for from that vantage--he flew into the higher branches of a nearby maple affording me an even better look at his magnificent scarlet plumage. For the past 16 years (as long as I lived here) a pair of cardinals has kept residence in the neighborhood. They nest in the thick prickly foliage of one of the towering american holly bushes/trees, with it's hypodermically spiked leaves and tightly twisted and stubby branches, it's an ingeniously safe place to raise a family.
And while very welcome visitors to my yard, neither of these birds is unusual.

So imagine my delight when I next saw a perfect specimen of a male rufous-sided towhee, pipilo erythrophthalmus. His coal black cap and red eyes and the bookends of raw umber feathers framing his bright white breast. It's the first time I've seen one of these in my yard.