Called also: BLACK-WINGED REDBIRD; FIREBIRD; CANADA TANAGER;
POCKET-BIRD
Length -- 7 to 7.5 inches. About one-fourth smaller than the
robin.
Male -- In spring plumage: Brilliant scarlet, with black wings
And tail. Under wing coverts grayish white. In autumn: Similar
To female.
Female -- Olive-green above; wings and tail dark, lightly
Margined with olive. Underneath greenish yellow.
Range -- North America to northern Canada boundaries, and
southwardin winter to South America.
Migrations -- May. October. Summer resident
The gorgeous coloring of the scarlet tanager has been its snare and
destruction. The densest evergreens could not altogether hide this blazing
target for the sportsman's gun, too often fired at the instigation of city
milliners. "Fine feathers make fine birds" -- and cruel, silly women, the
adage might be adapted for latter-day use. This rarely beautiful tanager,
thanks to them, is now only an infrequent flash of beauty in our country
roads.
Instinct leads it to be chary of its charms; and whereas it used to be one of
the commonest of bird neighbors, it is now shy and solitary. An ideal resort
for it is a grove of oak or swamp maple near a stream or pond where it can
bathe. Evergreen trees, too, are favorites, possibly because the bird knows
how exquisitely its bright scarlet coat is set off by their dark background.
High in the tree-tops he perches, all unsuspected by the visitor passing
through the woods below, until a burst of rich, sweet melody directs the
opera-glasses suddenly upward. There we detect him carolling loud and
cheerfully, like a robin. He is an apparition of beauty -- a veritable bird of
paradise, as, indeed, he is sometimes called. Because of their similar
coloring, the tanager and cardinal are sometimes confounded, but an instant's
comparison of the two birds shows nothing in common except red feathers, and
even those of quite different shades. The inconspicuous olive-green and yellow
of the female tanager's plumage is another striking instance of Nature's
unequal distribution of gifts; but if our bright-colored birds have become
shockingly few under existing conditions, would any at all remain were the
females prominent, like the males, as they brood upon the nest? Both tanagers
construct a rather disorderly-looking nest of fibres and sticks, through which
daylight can be seen where it rests securely upon the horizontal branch of
some oak or pine tree; but as soon as three or four bluish-green eggs have
been laid in the cradle, off goes the father, wearing his tell-tale coat, to a
distant tree. There he sings his sweetest carol to the patient, brooding mate,
returning to her side only long enough to feed her with the insects and
berries that form their food.
Happily for the young birds' fate, they are clothed at first in motley, dull
colors, with here and there only a bright touch of scarlet, yellow, and olive
to prove their claim to the parent whose gorgeous plumage must be their
admiration. But after the moulting season it would be a wise tanager that knew
its own father. His scarlet feathers are now replaced by an autumn coat of
olive and yellow not unlike his mate's.