The University of North Carolina Press

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March/April 1998


Charlotte Hilton Green on Cardinals

The late Charlotte Hilton Green was an early and influential champion of North Carolina's natural environment, and her popular weekly column, "Out-of-Doors in Carolina," appeared in the Raleigh News and Observer from 1932 to 1974. A classic in the field of popular nature writing, her Birds of the South was originally published by UNC Press in 1933, preceding by a year Roger Tory Peterson's landmark volume A Field Guide to the Birds.

In 1995, the Press reissued the book in paperback. Green's chapter on cardinals shows the how she blended practical information about birds with charming stories.

Copyright (c) 1995, the University of North Carolina Press. Reproduction or distribution is prohibited without the express permission of the University of North Carolina Press. All rights reserved.




The Cardinal

There is an old adage to the effect that "Beauty is its own undoing." In the past this has been far too true of the cardinal, our flaming redbird of the South, which used to be trapped and caged to send to Europe as a "Virginia Nightingale": and, I am ashamed to add, was also hunted and killed because women thought his feathers used as hat trimmings added to their own adornment. Today, a more humane and thoughtful generation sees that the cardinal is protected by law.

Our redbird, whose range is the eastern United States, but which is rare except in the South, is too familiar to every southerner to need much of a description. His bright rosy coat, black throat, with black about the base of the bill, his conspicuous red crest and bill, are known and loved throughout the South. The crest, wings, tail, and bill of the female are a duller rose, and the upper parts are ashy-brown, sometimes tinged with rose. A friend recently gave the best description of her that I know: "She looks as if she wore a chiffon veil over her rose dress."

And that is exactly what she does look like. At first one thinks of the female cardinal as being plainer than the male, but after living with them both, seeing them day by day, against gray skies, snowy landscapes, green pines, and summer bloom, I find my self delighting more and more in her delicate beauty.

Cardinals in a Colonial Garden

On a snowy winter day in old Williamsburg, Virginia, I saw my largest flock of cardinals. Before that, I had thought two or three, or a family group in one's garden, was bird wealth untold. Driving by an old colonial home on Nicholson Street, I saw this large flock in an ancient garden. Later, walking by, I saw them again, and feeling that anyone who managed to entice such a large flock of cardinals must also be a bird lover, and would forgive intrusion, I knocked at the door. Williamsburg, under the "Restoration," must have much of that, but if so, its people are more friendly to the stranger within its gates.

After explaining my interest in birds, I was asked to enter, and we sat in an ancient room, full of beautiful old furniture that would make any lover of antiques worshipful--and almost forgetful of birds. In front of the small-paned window was a great hackberry tree, one Japanese-like branch extending across the panes. While we sat and talked there were always from one to three or four cardinals, both male and female, on the snow-covered branch. No artist could have created a more perfect setting or background--and I added another to my bird-memory pictures.

I myself had counted fifteen cardinals in the group, but my hostess said they had often counted twenty-five. They are there the year round,for it is an old, old garden, with trees, grass, flowers, shrubbery, and many of the tangled growths so loved by birds--and is far more picturesque than the more formal gardens that have been restored.

The birds are given every protection possible from dogs and cats; they are supplied with water, and with all sorts of berry-bearing shrubs. They are fed also with suet, grains, nuts--with all kinds of foods that are loved by birds and, what was then new to me, doughnuts!

Since my return, I, too, have put doughnuts out, and the birds love them. For that was where I first learned that doughnuts were the best possible "open sesame" to Birddom.

Scarlet Wedding

There are always two or three cardinals in our own woods and garden. Towards spring the female accompanies the male more frequently, and we begin to hear soft murmurings of pretty! pretty!--and know that a little later there will be another scarlet wedding in our garden.

Several years ago our first pair of cardinals went to housekeeping in our Silver Moon rose, and the male was the most devoted one I have known. He divided his time between swaying high above the nest on the topmost spray, where he sang to his mate of his love and care, and perching on the rim of the bird bath, where, before drinking or bathing, he would pause, Narcissus-like, to gaze with an air of satisfaction at his scarlet reflection.

But it was well that he had that short time of rest, for though this cardinal was a vain spouse, he was a devoted one. Later in the season he nursed the first brood while his mate was busy with her second sitting.

He appeared most conscientious and a bit worried, apparently thinking all the world was in a conspiracy against his birdlings. The little ash-brown-washed-with-rose babies, which resembled the mother, were very beautiful in Papa Cardinal's eyes. How proud he was the first time he succeeded in coaxing them up to the rim of the bath! Forgotten then were all his own airs and graces, and throwing back his head he loudly whistled pretty! pretty! pretty! as if confiding to his near-by mate, "See, Mama, how smart our babies are!"

In contrast to our first nesting cardinals were this year's (1933) early nesting pair, which again built in the Silver Moon rose. They must have been different birds, for there was apparently little devotion between them. We saw the male about only occasionally, nor did he feed his mate so attentively.

The female left the nest each time the porch door was opened. Never, in all my years of bird study, have I seen a bird brood less than this one. We were unable to figure out how the eggs were ever incubated, but all were fruitful and the young nestlings throve. Later in the year there was another nest, probably by the same pair.

Shrubbery is the cardinal's chosen haunt, and the more tangled it is the better he likes it; but for his song he usually prefers a topmost branch. The nest is made of weed stems and leaves, and is usually lined with grass. It is built in a low bush, small tree, clump of bushes, or hedge, and often is but two to four feet from the ground, though all of ours have been higher, the last nest being over twelve feet up. There are usually three, sometimes four eggs, with a white ground, marked with reddish brown.

Nesting may begin as early as April and may continue until early July. More than one brood is raised, the male taking care of the first brood while the female is busy with her second. Family groups often stay together throughout the winter, and this proba bly accounts for the large number of cardinals in the Williamsburg garden.

Two broods to observe

We felt that we were particularly fortunate the past summer, for two broods of cardinals were raised within a few feet of the house. As there was a sufficient interval between nestings, we were sure they were by the same pair.

During the weeks that followed we watched the development of the two different age-groups. We saw the three of the first brood leave the nest. Already a bit of rose was discernible on the wings, but there was no tail, only a stub.

For over a week we were able to locate the three young birds daily in our woods, and to watch the stubs gradually develop into first a hint, then a promise, and eventually a real tial. We also observed the gradual coloring of the bill. Dark at first, slow ly it lightened, and then passed into stages of purple, raspberry, and at last red.

For several weeks the crests remained ashy, with no hint of color, but toward the end of the third month a bit of rose began to appear at the base of the crest, and gradually deepened and crept up. The breasts of the young males began to show streaks of r ose, until they gave promise of being as handsome Beau Brummels as their fathers.

The whistled call of pretty! pretty! pretty! is head though much of the year, and is rather similar to--and sometimes mistaken for--the tufted titmouse's whistled call of peto! peto! peto! A more complete song begins early in March and conti nues, with a few interruptions, until September. James Lane Allen, who has immortalized this bird in his story, The Kentucky Cardinal (the cardinal is he state bird of Kentucky), calls its song "a most melodious sigh." The female is herself a charm ing singer; to some her song is more pleasing than that of the male.

It would seem that a bird which gives us so much of color and beauty and song need not have any other assets, but the cardinal is of decided economic importance. "This bird has a record," says a government bulletin, "of feeding on many of the worst agricu ltural pests, including cotton-boll worm, codling moth, cotton cut worm, cucumber beetles, grasshoppers, scale insects, rose chafers, and various weed seeds, especially smart-weeds, bindweeds, bur, crab grass, thistle, plaintain." It also eats such berrie s as dogwood, holly, hackberries, elderberries, poke berries, wild cherries, sumac. Little, if any, attention is paid to cultivated fruits.


Birds of the South ($16.95 paperback) is available at bookstores or from the University of North Carolina Press. 1-800-848-6224. Say you saw it on our website.


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