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I get a lot of calls this time of year about strange “red birds with black heads” in their back yards. Those birds are the same red birds (cardinals) that live in your yard all year long, but in midsummer, they can look startlingly different. Here’s what’s happening.

Birds spend a lot of time caring for their feathers (preening). They condition their feathers using oil secreted from a gland at the base of their tail. The oil makes the feathers waterproof and discourages feather lice and other parasites that can weaken feathers and make them look ragged. You can see birds sometimes reaching back with their beaks and nibbling at the base of their tails. They will pick up some of this oil in their beak and then run their feathers through their beaks to coat the feathers with the oil.

The hardest place to reach with one’s bill is the head. Birds oil the feathers on their heads by swinging their heads back over their rumps or getting some oil on their claws and scratching their heads. But it’s always difficult to condition the feathers on the head, relative to other feathers on the body.

Now comes molting.

A bird’s feathers last for about year before they really break down and get ragged. Most songbirds molt in mid-late summer, after they are done nesting for the year. By July and August, cardinal feathers are getting pretty ratty, and it’s time to grow some new ones. Some cardinals, with an extra heavy load of feather parasites, will end up with feathers in such poor condition that they all fall out before the new ones come in. What feathers are in the worst shape? The feathers on the head. This problem isn’t unique to cardinals, but the black skin on a cardinal’s head can make for an unusual look indeed!
~tjo