Cardinal Bird

or Cardinal Grosbeak, a member of the sparrow or finch family. The cardinal is a lordly, clumsy, rose-red fellow with a large crest and a black throat. The female is olive brown. The cardinal breeds from Minnesota to the Gulf and eastward, nesting in bushes and making itself useful by eating grubs and worms. Both sexes sing well, and are favorite cage birds. Mrs. Olive Thorne Miller has written entertainingly of the cardinal.

One's first impression of the cardinal grosbeak will usually be that he is rather a clumsy fellow. His body appears to be stiff, as if it were made of wood, different in every way from the pliant, lithe body of the catbird, for example. He hops about on the ground with tail held well up out of harm's way, and comes heavily down upon his feet, as if his body were really very solid. In fact, he is not at all a graceful bird. . . .

As the head of a family, the cardinal is admirable, not only in his attentions to his lovely dove-colored mate, but in singing to her by the hour, and in protecting her from intrusion or danger. To the young in the nest he is an untiring provider of worms and grubs, and thus most useful in a garden. Nothing can be more comical than his behavior when he first conducts his young family out into the world while his mate is engaged with her second sitting. He is as fussy as any young mother, hopping about in great excitement, and appearing to think the whole world thirsting for the life of his pretty little ones.

The cardinal mother shows the restless manners and anxious spirit of her mate, taking one's intrusion upon her domestic affairs greatly to heart, and being so much disturbed that there is more pain than pleasure in making acquaintance with her nestlings.

See Grosbeak