The above is not a recent photo. First, the branches of the ball cypress tree are bare. Second, that’s a mature female cardinal looking very healthy.
A more recent photo is likely to have skittish, disheveled juvenile cardinals visiting the feeder outside my window. And the cypress resplendent with feather-like foliage.
Every year this time in central Florida I invariably observe two developments that speak of the heat and humidity. 1. odd, hairless sores/growths on the squirrels (new pups only?); 2. the older lily plants in our pond become freckled with what is likely to be some sort of parasite.
Hot and humid. A good way to turn up the volume on biological activity. For good and bad.
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Tags: biology, birds, nature, photography
August 10th, 2010 at 9:25 pm
For the last few years, we’ve had cardinals with strange, featherless, bluish shrunken heads above normally feathered bodies. I called them the Chernobyl Cardinals–really painful to see. I asked a bird expert of my acquaintance, who’d never heard of them. Much research later, I favored the mite infestation explanation, but some sources say it’s just a variation of normal molting patterns. Gave me the willies, either way.
August 11th, 2010 at 7:12 am
Nance -
Yup, have seen them. Particularly in summer. Look like they’re undergoing chemotherapy. Bluejays too with the nearly bald head condition.
The squirrels with the sores give me the biggest willies. I can hardly type this, but one I saw looked like it had a sizable white worm-thing living in the sore.
Wahwahwahwahwah! (Sound of me shaking my head as if I’m extremely cold, emitting an “I’ve been creeped-out” noise.)