News Bytes March/April 1998 |
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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. |
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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.
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.
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.
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.
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