Cardinalis cardinalis
Order Passeriformes
Family Cardinalidae
♂ Adult male.— Top and sides of head, conspicuous crest, and under parts bright red; forehead and throat black; back, wings, and tail tinged with gray; bill red.
♀ Adult female.— Crest, wings, and tail dull reddish; upper parts brownish; throat gray; rest of under parts dull buffy, sometimes showing a trace of red on the breast; bill light-colored.
Immature.— Similar to female, but bill blackish.
Nest, in bushes or vines, of twigs, bark, and rootlets.
Eggs, white or bluish-white, spotted with brown or lavender.
The Cardinal is a permanent resident of northern New Jersey, Staten Island, and the lower Hudson Valley, as far north as Hastings; it is rare on Long Island, but is not uncommon in Central Park; in New England it occurs only as an accidental visitor. It frequents thickets, especially along streams, mounting tall trees to utter its loud, pure whistle, but seeking its food in the shrubbery, or on the ground. In winter it frequents warm hollows on sheltered hillsides.
Its notes are too numerous to transcribe, but are nearly all loud and clear; the same note is generally repeated with energy and rapidly. Some common forms of the song resemble the syllables whoit, whoit, whoit, etc., kū, kū, kū, etc.; one form ends in a series of ee’s so long continued that it apparently ends only when the singer becomes out of breath.” The female also has sweet whistled notes, and both sexes utter as an alarm-note a sharp tsip, slight in proportion to the size of the bird.
There is no other bird in New York or New England with which the male Cardinal can be confused; the Tanager has black wings and tail, and no crest. The female shows a reddish tinge in her crest, wings, and tail, and, like the male, has a trick of nervously jerking her tail upward.
Hoffmann – A Guide to the Birds of New England and Eastern New York (1904)