Phainopepla - A native of Arizona

Phainopepla - Left (2016) and right (2008) - Photographed in Arizona

 OK - not my best photos of birds - but I have only ever seen them once - for each the male and female.  The female photo was taken with my Nikon D7200 and 80-400 S zoom while the male's was shot with my Nikon D200 and my non "S" 80-400 zoom.  The two systems are worlds apart, but both allowed me to do what I love, which is to get outdoors, see wildlife, and photograph it.

The species is fond of berries and often eats them from mistletoe, which is a plant parasite.  The downside to this is that the seeds are widely distributed from their droppings and offer new trees to parasitize.  They also eat the berries of a vast variety of plants and take insects, often on the wing, whenever they can.  

The males both build and defend the nest.  Although these birds are rarely found on the ground, they will forage there for nesting materials.  Their defensive behaviours depend greatly on food availability.  When food is present in quantity, they are more concerned with their nests and may even loosely form colonies in the same tree.  If food is scarce, they actively defend the nest and any nearby fruit trees, especially if they contain mistletoe.  

Phainopeplas may eat up to 1100 mistletoe berries a day.  The plant and bird have developed a somewhat loose mutualistic relationship in that the plant benefits from the distribution of the berries and the bird benefits from food.  Both can survive without each other, but they seem to do better together.

I hope to get better photos of them another time, now that I have better equipment.  However, I won't be going down to the States anytime soon.  I think you know why.

Thanks for reading.

Eric Svendsen     www.ericspix.com