Painted Buntings—small, colorful neotropical songbirds—are
fairly familiar sights in some portions of the southern United States during
the spring and summer. Although they’re
not as abundant in most of these regions as the Indigo Bunting (they outnumber
Indigo Buntings in Texas and New Mexico), they still occur in decent
numbers. If you’ve seen Painted Buntings,
you are probably most familiar with the adult males, whose vibrant plumage and
habit of singing from high perches make them more noticeable than females and
immature males. The typical male Painted
Bunting has a blue-violet head, a grass-green back, green wings, and red underparts.
 |
| Adult male Painted Bunting |
 |
| Adult male Painted Bunting -- the head looks purple in the sun. |
While adult males may be more obvious, you can also
frequently observe females and immature males—if you know what to look
for! Like the males, female Painted
Buntings can be attracted to bird feeders, and you can also sometimes see them
foraging in vegetation when they’re away from the nest. They do tend to be more secretive than males,
though. Their plumage is essentially
all-over leaf green, which makes them cryptic but also unusual for North
American songbirds.
 |
| Female Painted Bunting |
Adult and immature females look similar, but it might come
as a surprise that immature males are also green all over. Painted Bunting males take two years to achieve
their iconic red, green, and blue plumage—a strategy called delayed plumage
maturation. Immature males sometimes
manage to breed, but because older males tend to outcompete them for high-quality
territories, their breeding success is usually lower. However, spending this “gap year” to learn how
things are done may benefit male Painted Buntings. In any case, if you see a green Painted
Bunting singing, you can be pretty sure that it’s a younger male, probably
still learning the ropes.
 |
| Singing immature male Painted Bunting |
It’s important to note that not all Painted Buntings exhibit
textbook plumage patterns. This male
that I saw several years ago in Arkansas had a yellow band across his
breast. He was singing in a stretch of
scrubby woods near a river.
 |
| Adult male Painted Bunting |
The male in the next photo had more of an orange breast than
a red one. It’s possible that he did not
consume enough carotenoids during the molting process, although he looks pretty
healthy in other ways. If you’re living
somewhere within the Painted Bunting breeding range, be sure to watch for these
colorful birds this summer, and make note of any interesting plumages and
behaviors that you notice!
 |
| Adult male Painted Bunting |
