A cardinal and her Journey
A breeze coming in from the West shakes an emerald green arborvitae, disturbing a dwelling made of twigs, bark, grass, and moss. The dwelling cups four speckled eggs and moments later, their deliverer arrives, enveloping her tan and red hued feathers around them after quickly being fed by her mate. She sings to her mate to inform him she is at the nest, something other female bird species do not do. She sits, the crisp gust continuing to sway the tall bush. The cold is letting out slowly this year, but she and her mate can sense the warm weather drawing near. The rains have started, and things are beginning to move; they can hear it beneath the ground, see and hear it in the sky and in the trees. The sun has moved, drawing farther away from the horizon day by day.
A few days pass and all the eggs hatch but one. The female hatchling shifts around the nest, darkness will be her world for the next four to six days. After the first visit from her mother, who brought food, warmth, and much movement to the nest, the female hatchling and her brother keep their necks extended and their mouths open when their mother leaves again, blindly waiting for more movement and noise while the other hatchling sits resting his head. The unhatched egg remains still until the mother pushes it aside. It will remain there until it gets buried into the nest or it somehow falls from it. By the third day, all three hatchlings are hyper sensitive to movement. Any shake, any sound will have their heads shoot up and their mouths wide open. Their eyes are large dark bulbs on the sides of their heads.
They are fed fat grubs multiple times every hour. The nest is warm and even warmer when their mother is there to shelter them with her down and waterproof feathers. They do not see their father much for the first few days of life, for he goes into a food-collecting frenzy for both mother and children, but they do hear him call to their mother. The female hatchling’s eyes are slit open after three days, allowing light to filter through faintly. The chicks mainly rely on their physical senses, such as movement of the nest, and sound; their ability to hear is still developing, however. Their mother leaves the nest to join the father searching for food and the chicks remain low in the nest unless they believe their mother or father is near. By day six, the female hatchling’s eyes have opened entirely. She now sees her siblings, can see the dwelling she sits in and the vegetation that surrounds the nest, tucked away in the emerald green arborvitae. Although detecting movement remains an important sense, she can now see and hear her parents as they approach the nest. Her “upward vision” is a little sharper than her side vision, that is, she can detect movement from above better than from the sides. The days are cold and wet but there is sound all around which only grows in intensity as the days go on by, bird songs of different kinds, the trees creaking against the wind, mammals awakening below them, searching for food. The female hatchling’s feathers have begun to crawl up her neck and little head. She and her siblings huddle with their chests facing each other’s, their small wings draping over the others to keep warm against the chilly and wet spring weather. Their mother returns and warms them as rainstorms pass.
While the female chick and her siblings wait for their parents to bring them food, they peer out over and above the nest, seeing the trees alongside them and grassy space before them. As their parents feed them eight to ten times every hour, the chicks defecate quite often, leaving sacks of their excrement on the outside of the nest for their father to carry away to avoid attracting predators. Ten days after hatching, the female chick and her siblings are covered in thicker-than-down gray feathers and move freely around the nest. Their parents return with food much more often than before, frenzied, and the female chick greets them eagerly with chirps and a wide-open beak, even standing on her legs to reach. Their bodies are eager to leap, the nest no longer seems suitable for her. The following day, she and her siblings hop out of the nest and attempt their first fledge.
Throughout their venture outside the nest, both parents continue to constantly feed the chicks, leaving them in new bushes for them to experience until they have the urge for flight. The female chick is the second to attempt flight. She sits on a bush, growing impatient for her parents to bring her food; she is hungry and the instinct to find her own food on her own time kicks in. With a burst of the legs and wings, the female chick leaps onto a higher standing tree. Her father is there to witness the moment. Even after learning to fly, the chick continues to rely on her parents for food until she has matured enough to find food for herself. After about four days of attempting and practicing flight, the female chick can get around fairly easy. The next step is to teach the chicks a large variety of songs and dialects, which is the father’s job. While he teaches them, their mother retires from the family for some time to rest and prepare for her next brood.
The female chick listens intently to her father’s songs, responding with chirps. She practices by communicating with her father and by listening to her mother, who occasionally communicates with her father during this time. After 60 days of listening and occasionally responding, the female chick has grown closer to maturity. Her wings are brownish, but she lacks the red hue on her tail and wings. The weather is warm, and food is abundant. The female cardinal remains with her family throughout the summer until her parents eventually drive her and her siblings away. She is able to stay close to one of her siblings; the third chick had stopped singing and was no longer able to be located. The female fledgling and her brother remain in different trees but close enough to detect the other.
By late summer, the female has come across owls, cats, and hawks but remains well hidden in plain sight because of her natural-colored plumage and she avoids predators in this way. She has a close call one evening within the last few weeks of summer; while resting in a honeysuckle an owl swoops into the bush, seconds away from sinking its talons into her back. But she heard its entry into the vegetation and was able to slip away by taking off. A few days after this close encounter, she stumbles upon what she had been looking out for as the cold months drew nearer, a group of juvenile cardinals. When the first frost covers the land and temperatures drop, berries provided by the variety of bushes in the area feed her and those who stayed for the winter. The observation of different species leaving or moving underground is a new experience, but she takes note of the supply of food that remains constant. She stays on the same forest front she was born in but explores about a mile in every direction, cutting through cold air in search of berries and seeds. Sometimes she finds objects that are filled with seeds, objects that leave the seeds untouched by snow. She simply must land on the object and collect the seeds from it. Other times she must only survive on berries the winter brush provides.
Winter brings much snow and a new melody to the trees. Woodpeckers search for slumbering insects within the wood; trees creak against the weight of the snow and the wind; the grasslands are hushed. When storms blow through, the female huddles in tree hollows until morning.
Months roll by and the female cardinal grows an edge for survival in the heart of winter. Her experiences sharpen her sensitivity to her surroundings and her tail and wings are now tipped with red. Her beak is no longer black, but pale orange. The rivers and creeks begin to move more freely as ice begins to melt, the ground thaws and a new fond movement can be noticed. Migrating birds begin to arrive, buds on plants begin to surface. Fresh flashes of red begin to appear more aggressively as male cardinals begin their search for a mate. She listens carefully to the back and forth of the different males who battle for territory. One approaches her but does not impress her and she flies off to another area on the forest front. Then, there, a sound that causes her head to cock to the side a certain way. A melody with the right volume and force; she accepts. The male approaches her and he flutters his wings repeatedly, hopping around her. She keeps a sharp eye on his movements and when she outstretches her neck and the crown on her head stands, the male’s movements intensify in response to her reaction. Their body language sync in a whirlpool way and after they lean forward and have their beaks lock up in a gentle gesture, the two fly off and mate.
Sources:
https://www.intothedeep.net/four-baby-cardinals
https://www.psu.edu/dept/nkbiology/naturetrail/speciespages/cardinal.htm#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20northern%20cardinals%20live,cardinal%20is%2028%20%C2%BD%20years!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIbgmP9sFNU
https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/condor/v088n02/p0156-p0159.pdf
https://forum.americanexpedition.us/northern-cardinal-facts#:~:text=Northern%20Cardinals%20are%20very%20good,until%20they%20leave%20the%20nest.
A few days pass and all the eggs hatch but one. The female hatchling shifts around the nest, darkness will be her world for the next four to six days. After the first visit from her mother, who brought food, warmth, and much movement to the nest, the female hatchling and her brother keep their necks extended and their mouths open when their mother leaves again, blindly waiting for more movement and noise while the other hatchling sits resting his head. The unhatched egg remains still until the mother pushes it aside. It will remain there until it gets buried into the nest or it somehow falls from it. By the third day, all three hatchlings are hyper sensitive to movement. Any shake, any sound will have their heads shoot up and their mouths wide open. Their eyes are large dark bulbs on the sides of their heads.
They are fed fat grubs multiple times every hour. The nest is warm and even warmer when their mother is there to shelter them with her down and waterproof feathers. They do not see their father much for the first few days of life, for he goes into a food-collecting frenzy for both mother and children, but they do hear him call to their mother. The female hatchling’s eyes are slit open after three days, allowing light to filter through faintly. The chicks mainly rely on their physical senses, such as movement of the nest, and sound; their ability to hear is still developing, however. Their mother leaves the nest to join the father searching for food and the chicks remain low in the nest unless they believe their mother or father is near. By day six, the female hatchling’s eyes have opened entirely. She now sees her siblings, can see the dwelling she sits in and the vegetation that surrounds the nest, tucked away in the emerald green arborvitae. Although detecting movement remains an important sense, she can now see and hear her parents as they approach the nest. Her “upward vision” is a little sharper than her side vision, that is, she can detect movement from above better than from the sides. The days are cold and wet but there is sound all around which only grows in intensity as the days go on by, bird songs of different kinds, the trees creaking against the wind, mammals awakening below them, searching for food. The female hatchling’s feathers have begun to crawl up her neck and little head. She and her siblings huddle with their chests facing each other’s, their small wings draping over the others to keep warm against the chilly and wet spring weather. Their mother returns and warms them as rainstorms pass.
While the female chick and her siblings wait for their parents to bring them food, they peer out over and above the nest, seeing the trees alongside them and grassy space before them. As their parents feed them eight to ten times every hour, the chicks defecate quite often, leaving sacks of their excrement on the outside of the nest for their father to carry away to avoid attracting predators. Ten days after hatching, the female chick and her siblings are covered in thicker-than-down gray feathers and move freely around the nest. Their parents return with food much more often than before, frenzied, and the female chick greets them eagerly with chirps and a wide-open beak, even standing on her legs to reach. Their bodies are eager to leap, the nest no longer seems suitable for her. The following day, she and her siblings hop out of the nest and attempt their first fledge.
Throughout their venture outside the nest, both parents continue to constantly feed the chicks, leaving them in new bushes for them to experience until they have the urge for flight. The female chick is the second to attempt flight. She sits on a bush, growing impatient for her parents to bring her food; she is hungry and the instinct to find her own food on her own time kicks in. With a burst of the legs and wings, the female chick leaps onto a higher standing tree. Her father is there to witness the moment. Even after learning to fly, the chick continues to rely on her parents for food until she has matured enough to find food for herself. After about four days of attempting and practicing flight, the female chick can get around fairly easy. The next step is to teach the chicks a large variety of songs and dialects, which is the father’s job. While he teaches them, their mother retires from the family for some time to rest and prepare for her next brood.
The female chick listens intently to her father’s songs, responding with chirps. She practices by communicating with her father and by listening to her mother, who occasionally communicates with her father during this time. After 60 days of listening and occasionally responding, the female chick has grown closer to maturity. Her wings are brownish, but she lacks the red hue on her tail and wings. The weather is warm, and food is abundant. The female cardinal remains with her family throughout the summer until her parents eventually drive her and her siblings away. She is able to stay close to one of her siblings; the third chick had stopped singing and was no longer able to be located. The female fledgling and her brother remain in different trees but close enough to detect the other.
By late summer, the female has come across owls, cats, and hawks but remains well hidden in plain sight because of her natural-colored plumage and she avoids predators in this way. She has a close call one evening within the last few weeks of summer; while resting in a honeysuckle an owl swoops into the bush, seconds away from sinking its talons into her back. But she heard its entry into the vegetation and was able to slip away by taking off. A few days after this close encounter, she stumbles upon what she had been looking out for as the cold months drew nearer, a group of juvenile cardinals. When the first frost covers the land and temperatures drop, berries provided by the variety of bushes in the area feed her and those who stayed for the winter. The observation of different species leaving or moving underground is a new experience, but she takes note of the supply of food that remains constant. She stays on the same forest front she was born in but explores about a mile in every direction, cutting through cold air in search of berries and seeds. Sometimes she finds objects that are filled with seeds, objects that leave the seeds untouched by snow. She simply must land on the object and collect the seeds from it. Other times she must only survive on berries the winter brush provides.
Winter brings much snow and a new melody to the trees. Woodpeckers search for slumbering insects within the wood; trees creak against the weight of the snow and the wind; the grasslands are hushed. When storms blow through, the female huddles in tree hollows until morning.
Months roll by and the female cardinal grows an edge for survival in the heart of winter. Her experiences sharpen her sensitivity to her surroundings and her tail and wings are now tipped with red. Her beak is no longer black, but pale orange. The rivers and creeks begin to move more freely as ice begins to melt, the ground thaws and a new fond movement can be noticed. Migrating birds begin to arrive, buds on plants begin to surface. Fresh flashes of red begin to appear more aggressively as male cardinals begin their search for a mate. She listens carefully to the back and forth of the different males who battle for territory. One approaches her but does not impress her and she flies off to another area on the forest front. Then, there, a sound that causes her head to cock to the side a certain way. A melody with the right volume and force; she accepts. The male approaches her and he flutters his wings repeatedly, hopping around her. She keeps a sharp eye on his movements and when she outstretches her neck and the crown on her head stands, the male’s movements intensify in response to her reaction. Their body language sync in a whirlpool way and after they lean forward and have their beaks lock up in a gentle gesture, the two fly off and mate.
Sources:
https://www.intothedeep.net/four-baby-cardinals
https://www.psu.edu/dept/nkbiology/naturetrail/speciespages/cardinal.htm#:~:text=On%20average%2C%20northern%20cardinals%20live,cardinal%20is%2028%20%C2%BD%20years!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIbgmP9sFNU
https://sora.unm.edu/sites/default/files/journals/condor/v088n02/p0156-p0159.pdf
https://forum.americanexpedition.us/northern-cardinal-facts#:~:text=Northern%20Cardinals%20are%20very%20good,until%20they%20leave%20the%20nest.