Friday, March 19, 2010

Bird Sightings: a Phainopeplas

Every morning as I head from my vehicle to the building where my office is located, I scan the desert, watching for birds. My office building is located near some undeveloped desert, and I see different birds there, than visit my home feeders.  I spied this little guy today, and looked him up at the Arizona Desert Museum website. The Phainopeplas is one of 4 species of silky fly-catchers and he mainly feeds on the mistletoe berries.  There are several trees in the desert nearby that are overgrown with parasitic mistletoe so that explains his presence in the area.  He really looks just like a black cardinal- with his pretty spiky crest.

5 comments:

Carol said...

When I read it fed on Mistletoe berries I had to check to see if it was in the SE...it's not...I hope you can get more photos. It looks like a beautiful bird.

www.wildlifearoundus.blogspot.com

PAK ART said...

Every once in a great while I'll see a Blue Jay up here with that crested look. I've seen cardinals in the states. I think they are such handsome birds, I love that crested head.

Desert Swamp Dweller said...

That was one of my first "new" birds that I saw when I moved west.

Claude said...

he's a cool looking guy... never heard of them before. Are they as shy as cardinals?

Ezhilan said...

What a cute bird is it! In our area too, there are many varieties of birds but I cannot take pictures of all of them as they are shy of the camera!