Ask Kenn Kaufman: Are Yellow Northern Cardinals Becoming More Common?
Also answered in this month's column: Why are some birds such better mimics than others?
Who's Kenn? Simply put, Kenn isa national treasure. Arenowned birder, author,and conservationist, Kenn Kaufmanhas spent his life dedicated to observing birds, reading about birds, writing about birds, and sharingthe world of birds with others. With all that birdy knowledge in his brain, he also acts as the field editor forܻܲDzmagazine. So, whenever we have a bird question stumping us around the office, we just ask Kenn. And now you can, too! If you have a bird or birding question you'd like Kenn to answer, leave them in the comments on Facebook or send us an email. Maybe next month you'll get the kind of thorough, thoughtful, and even humorous response from Kenn we've grown so fond of over the years.—The Editors
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Question: Is it just me, or are yellow Northern Cardinals becoming more common? I feel like more people are seeing them.
Kenn Kaufman:When the brilliant red of a male Northern Cardinal is replaced by brilliant yellow, the effect can be stunning for anyone accustomed to the bird’s normal appearance. Such variantsdo occur, but they are very rare.
APP featured a story about one such cardinalspotted in Alabama in 2018.At the time,birders consultedGeoffrey Hill from Auburn University, an expert on bird coloration,for insights on why this bird was yellow. Hill has since released.Basically, the red, orange, and yellow colors in birds’ feathers are created with carotenoid pigments derived from the foods they eat. In the male Northern Cardinal, yellow pigments from the dietapparentlyare converted to red by a specific enzyme. In a very rare genetic mutation, probably affecting fewer than one in a million cardinals, that enzyme is lacking, so the conversion to red doesn’t occur and the feathers are bright yellow instead.
During the last couple of years, we’ve seen reports of such yellow Northern Cardinals in Florida, Illinois,Tennessee, North Carolina,and elsewhere.But are such birdsreallyoccurring more often inthe total cardinal population? Or are we just hearing about more of them? Although ’s impossible to be certain, I strongly suspect ’s the latter.
The first time I heardabout a yellow cardinal, about 40years ago, it wasthrough a string of coincidences. Someone had seen such a bird at their feeder and mentioned it to a neighbor, and ultimately a local APP chapter newsletter carried a few lines about this odd bird. A friend of mine saw the note in the newsletter and happened to mention it to me. That was it. No photos, no press coverage, no media attention. And that was standard for odd birds at backyard feeders until very recently.
Today the world is connectedlike never before. Communication about birdshadalreadyramped up considerably in the 1990s with the adventof birdinglistserves, and now it hasmultiplied many times over with the rise of social media. An unusual bird now can “go viral” if it captures the imagination of the public. That was what happened with the Alabama yellow cardinalin 2018.After Charlie Stephenson discovered the bird and Jeremy Black took superb photos, it became an internetsensation,with photos sharedtens ofthousands of times. Stephenson and Black even createdcelebrating this individual.
And as the fame of this cardinal spread,and the public became aware of its special status,other people started reporting that they had seen such birds as well. What would have merited a shrug anda“Hmm, that’s funny” in the past had now been anointed as worthy of note, worth sharing on social media.
Is there a conservation angle to this story? It’s always a good thing when people pay more attention to birds, of course. But the Northern Cardinal is one of the more abundant birds in NorthAmerica. Its populationhas beenestimated at more than100 million, and stable or increasing. But there is a South American bird actually named the(Gubernatrixcristata). It’s notat allrelated (it belongsto the tanager family), and far from being abundant, ’s considered an endangered species, with a population in the low thousands at best. Maybe we could figure out a way for fans of yellow cardinals in the U.S. to support conservation of Yellow Cardinals in South America.
Q: Why do birds imitate other birds and sounds? And why are certainbirds such bettermimics than others?
KK:Skill at imitatingsounds is widespread amongvarious groups ofbirds. Althoughthe Northern Mockingbird is famed, and named, for this ability,’s hardly the onlymimic out there.Blue Jays can do a perfect rendition of a Red-tailed Hawk, and Steller’s Jays can nail the Red-shouldered Hawk.Lesser Goldfinches mimic parts of the songs of dozens of other birds; Lawrence’s Goldfinches mightmimic fewer kinds of birds, but with higher quality imitations.A male European Starling caninclude imitations of more than 60 other bird species (and other sounds) in its repertoire.
Many species of parrots have an outstanding ability to copy human speech,but in the wild, they seem to use their mimicking powers mostly to imitate members of their own species, not other kinds of birds. On the other hand, some birds are virtuosos ofcopyingeverything within earshot. The Superb Lyrebird in Australia, for example,can perform highly accurate imitations of dozens of other bird species and of numerous other sounds—including, sadly, even the noiseof chain saws destroying its habitat.
But my favorite mimic is Lawrence’s Thrush, a drab brown bird of the lowland rain forest in South America. At dawninsoutheastern Peru, I have listenedin aweas a Lawrence’s Thrush, hidden in the treetops,reeled off brief but perfect imitations ofmore thana dozen different birds in rapid succession. In the same region, the late Ted Parker once recorded a male that included imitations ofno fewer than51 bird species in a single continuous bout of singing.
These are extreme examples ,and most birds don’t make any sounds that we would recognize as mimicry. But the ability to hear a sound and copy it is actually very widespread among birds. In fact, ’s essential.Among the true songbirds, as well as parrots and hummingbirds, individuals have tolearntheir songs. Studies on many species suggest that they are born with a basic template for the song of their own kind, but unless they actually hear it, they will never learn to sing it correctly. So a certain level of copying is present, and even necessary,in a vast array of different birds.
The majority of these birds use this ability only to copy others of their own kind—faithfully claiming the vocal identity of their species,learning the local dialect, or matching songs with their neighbors. So why do a few species take itto a different level, appropriating songs fromother birds andcopyingsounds from the environment?
Bird songs serve two main purposes:Defending territory and attracting (or maintaining contact with) a mate.An impressive song, like colorful plumage or fancy display postures,can serve as a way of signalingan individual’sfitness—fitto hold a territory against all rivals, fit to be an excellentmate.Of course, different species will have differentinstincts as to what constitutes animpressive song. For some, thesize of the repertoire is key: The bird that can sing the mostdifferent songs will be perceivedas superior.And what easier way to add to the playlist than simply copying any sound you hear?
Ultimately, however, we don’t know why this vocal behavior evolves in some species and not others. We might imagine that Lawrence’s Thrush developed great mimicry to make up for its plainappearance, but several related South American thrushes are equally dull-colored, and they don’t mimic sounds. We couldguessthat this behavior is tied to certain habitats, but excellent mimics are found everywhere, from dense rain forest to deserts. So far, no one has come up with aconvincingcommon thread that would link all the great bird mimics of the world, and this would be an absorbing mystery for someone to solve in the future.
Have a bird or birdingquestion for Kenn? Email it toaudubonmagazine@audubon.org.