This is bird note. What's the most colorful bird in the U.S.? The Scarletanager?

Maybe the painted bunting. Well, consider one more lustrous candidate, the purple galanule.

The purple galanule's feathers are so iridescent that they might not seem real.

The head, neck, and underparts are purple.

Colors shade down the back from purple to indigo to azure to golden green.

The forehead is blue, beak red, and legs yellow.

Catching the sun, the entire bird shimmers.

Despite its bold style, a purple galadule can be hard to spot.

The colors create excellent camouflage among the greens, blues, and floral highlights of a marsh.

With lightweight bodies and extremely long toes, galanol stride deftly atop water

lilies and other vegetation, snatching up snails, insects, and plants of many kinds.

The purple galanol might sound impractical with its big feet and vivid colors,

but find one in a marsh, and all the parts of this bizarre bird will suddenly make sense.

For bird note, I'm Michael Stein.

Support comes from Wild Delight Bird Food,

offering a variety of blends designed to mimic the natural resources wild birds crave.

Available at chewy.com.