The brilliantly coloured Scarlet Tananger

By Al Lowe
Contributor

This is probably the most brilliantly colored bird in Northwestern Ontario. Yet most folk will not likely have ever seen one, even though they are quite common. The male bird is absolutely flaming red with jet black wings and tail. The colors are so intense that they seem like tropical birds. And indeed, tanagers are tropical. This is the only one which lives in eastern Canada at all.
How can such a brilliant bird be so invisible? It is a bird of the dense treetops. It nests high in trees, finds it food there, and seldom comes down. You may see it fly across the road one day, but you can walk in the woods for years and never see one at all.
The Tanager's song can help identify it. It is something like that of a robin, but with a raspy quality to it - like a robin with a sore throat.
The female is not brightly colored at all. She is greenish and yellow, with darker wings. She blends into the foliage, and can become invisible just by sitting still. In the fall, the male, too, becomes dull greenish and brownish, and so are the young birds in their first year.
Tanagers live mainly on insects. They move methodically through the trees, rooting out beetles, grubs, larvae, flies and so on. They are especially fond of some of the most destructive insects. They have been called the 'guardians of the oaks' because of their appetite for the little green caterpillars which infest oaks in the spring. One man watched tanagers eating gypsy moth caterpillars in an orchard, and he kept count. Each one ate 35 per minute for 18 minutes. If they ate at this rate for only one hour a day, they would consume nearly 15 000 in a week. A great help indeed!
Migration is a big deal for these birds. Most of them winter in South America, some as far away as Peru. In the spring, all of the species migrate together across the Caribbean to the south eastern states. From there, they spread out to the eastern half of the continent.
Scarlet Tanagers are not particular about the kinds of trees in which they live. They are equally at home in the oaks of Michigan or in the pines of north Ontario. Watch for a brilliant bird at the very tops of the trees. Most ornithologists and just plain birdwatchers still get quite a thrill from seeing the fire-red and jet black of our only tanager.
The Scarlet Tanager, Piranga olivacea, brings a touch of the tropics to our northern woods.