Scarlet Tanager and Butterfly Weed

On Friday this wonderful bird along with his "wife" took a bath in our backyard stream. The male Scarlet Tanager would fly down into the water nd then perch on the Mimosa tree above the pond. What a joy to watch this brillant bird! The male is this vivid red with black wings and tail. The female is an olive green and not as exotic looking.

Scarlet Tanagers are unusual among the 230 species of the Neotropical tanager family because they have seasonal changes in plumage. Only one other tanager, a South American species, does this. The male changes his striking breeding plumage of scarlet and black for an olive green color that is similar to the plumage of the female Scarlet Tanager.

We are almost into the official start of summer. It has been extremely dry. The deer have eaten our Bee Balm. So far they have not devored our butterfly weed which is a species of milkweed. Mostly we have raised the brillant orange but a new critter has appeared. As you can see it is very yellow. The bottom photo is the normal orange that usually appears.