We can't seem to get enough of fledglings around here; my other half and I have taken to spending a good bit of time on the screened porch to see which avian adolescents are resisting their parents' attempts to teach them self-sufficiency. The finches and sparrows are still around in great numbers, but this week's amusement has been caused by juvenile cardinals.
The juveniles resemble adult females with their handsome rosy brown feathers, though they've yet to develop the pink beak, and they're nearly as large as the adult birds. This near-indistinguishability from Mama Bird makes the baby behavior all the more amusing as these ungainly creatures perch on the feeder pole or the sunflower feeder, lean over, waggle their tails and flutter their wing feathers, all the while making pitiful "I'm starving--feed me now" sounds.
Sometimes there were two hungry juveniles.
For some reason, only the male was feeding the babies. We don't know if the female was on the nest again or what, but the poor guy was busy, and the finch wasn't helping him.
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