Monday, October 3, 2011,

Here are two young Cardinals that I saw at Sweetbriar. I’m fairly certain that they were from the same clutch as both of these birds and an adult pair were all traveling together and remained close during the half-hour or so that I was taking these pics. The bird in the first photo appears to be well on its way to male coloration while the bird in the second pic seems to be female. This is just conjecture on my part. I didn’t look under any skirts to check. I do notice that the female’s bill is already red. More conjecture here, but maybe females can achieve red bills sooner than males because they don’t need to use as much red pigment in their feathers. I don’t know any of this; I’m just making a guess. I don’t really know the ways of nature. I just wonder at them. JK

JK