This is Bird Note.

If you examine closely the colors, shades, and adornments of Cedar Wax Wings, these sleek

and handsome foragers may become your favorite bird.

Cedar Wax Wings display a wealth of eye-catching plumage from a cinnamon-brown, backswept crest

to a black mask edged with white and a bright yellow border on their tails.

In those wax wings, well, if you look carefully, you'll see what appear to be drops of red

wax on the tips of their secondary flight feathers.

Cedar Wax Wings have a quiet voice.

If you can hear their song, it's only a very soft trilling, and even then, it's fairly

hard for people to hear.

Because they are communal feeders, they don't sing to establish individual feeding territories.

Instead, they use their high-pitched trills and buzzy calls to keep track of each other

in their small flocks.

You can enjoy the company of Cedar Wax Wings when you plant fruit-bearing trees and shrubs,

such as mountain ash, crab apple, mulberry, and hawthorn.

During winter, the birds wander widely in search of food because their diet consists almost

entirely of fruit.

But summer or winter, invite these stylish visitors for a meal in your yard.

See a stunning photograph of a Cedar Wax Wing and find out more about the native plants

they prefer on our website, birdnote.org.

I'm Mary McCann.