Red Birds in North Carolina

Stand at a North Carolina feeder in February and a male Cardinalis cardinalis - the Northern Cardinal - arrives eventually, as reliable as the post. He is not the only red bird in the state. He is just the only one present on that February morning. By May the roster expands to include two tanager species that share the state without ever quite sharing the same forest.

That split - elevation-sorted, arrival-staggered - is the most interesting thing about red birds in North Carolina, and most visitors miss it entirely.

The cardinal: the state’s permanent occupant

The Northern Cardinal became North Carolina’s official state bird on March 8, 1943, ratified under Session Law 1943, Chapter 595. The public vote that produced that result is worth knowing. According to NCpedia, the North Carolina Bird Club ran a campaign through newspapers, birding clubs, and schools that collected more than 23,000 ballots. The cardinal won with roughly 5,000 votes. The dove came second with 3,395. Before this, in 1933, the legislature had briefly designated the Carolina Chickadee - then repealed the resolution within a week, deciding the Chickadee’s nickname, the Tomtit, was insufficiently dignified for a state symbol.

The cardinal earned its plurality. It is the only fully red, crested, stout-billed bird a North Carolinian sees year-round in every county. Audubon measures the male at 8 to 9 inches long, with a wingspan of 9 to 12 inches and a weight of 1.5 to 1.7 ounces. He does not migrate. He does not dull his plumage in winter. The red you see at a Charlotte feeder in December is the same bird who defended that territory in April.

His color is dietary. The carotenoid pigments that produce it come from wild fruits - Audubon notes wild grapes and dogwood berries among sources - and a well-fed male in autumn produces a brighter spring plumage. Females select mates partly on plumage brightness, which makes autumn diet a form of long-term investment. Both sexes sing, which is unusual among North American songbirds - the female calls from the nest to cue the male on when to bring food. Audubon puts the current global population at approximately 130 million, stable. Six other states share the cardinal as state bird: Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Ohio, Virginia, and West Virginia.

The two tanagers and the elevation line

In May, two tanagers arrive in North Carolina from South America and divide the state between them by forest type.

Piranga rubra, the Summer Tanager, takes the lower ground. He is entirely rosy-red - Audubon describes the adult male as the only all-red North American bird with “no black in the wings,” which separates him immediately from the Scarlet. Audubon measures him at 6.7 to 7.5 inches with a wingspan of 11 to 12 inches. He prefers dry open woodland dominated by oak, hickory, or pine - habitat common through the Piedmont and Coastal Plain. He arrives in late April and holds territory through July. Audubon notes that he catches bees and wasps in mid-air and rubs off the stinger against a branch before swallowing - one of the few birds in North Carolina to do so regularly.

Piranga olivacea, the Scarlet Tanager, wants higher and denser forest. The breeding male is the most visually startling bird in the state: blood-red body, jet-black wings and tail. Audubon measures him at approximately 7.5 inches and places his preferred breeding habitat in “deciduous forest, mainly where oaks are common but also in maple, beech, and other trees; sometimes in mixed pine-oak woods.” In North Carolina that means the mountain hardwood ridges. He arrives in late April to early May, crossing the Gulf of Mexico at night. He needs large intact forest blocks - fragmented woodland draws cowbird parasitism and suppresses breeding success, per Audubon. He is quiet in the canopy and easy to miss unless you follow the burry, rasping song. By late summer he molts into winter plumage - dull greenish with black wings - before heading to the northern Andes.

In North Carolina, where you park determines which tanager you find. The Summer Tanager works the Piedmont pine-oak. The Scarlet Tanager is in the mountain hardwoods. They rarely overlap.

The point matters because first-time visitors sometimes drive to the mountains in late April expecting tanagers and find nothing - the Scarlets have not arrived and the Summers are in the Piedmont they just left. The timing and elevation both have to be right.

The finches: a winter swap

Two red finches occupy North Carolina’s feeders in partly overlapping seasons, and they repay a second look.

Haemorhous mexicanus, the House Finch, holds year-round across North Carolina’s suburbs and farms. Audubon describes the male as showing red concentrated on the forehead, eyebrow, throat, and breast, with a brown cap and streaked flanks. Some males run to orange rather than red, the intensity depending on carotenoids available the previous autumn. Audubon lists the House Finch at 5 to 6 inches and the global population at 40 million.

Haemorhous purpureus, the Purple Finch, is primarily a winter visitor - breeding in coniferous and mixed forests further north, then moving south when food is scarce. He is stockier and shorter-tailed than the House Finch, more uniformly raspberry-red across head, chest, and back, without the House Finch’s contrasting brown cap. Audubon notes that female Purple Finches carry a noticeably stronger face pattern - a clear white eyebrow stripe that the female House Finch lacks. The Purple Finch population stands at an estimated 6.5 million, Least Concern but declining in the northeast, partly through competition with the House Finch.

The practical field rule: a House Finch at a winter feeder in any North Carolina town is expected. A Purple Finch is worth a photograph and a second look.

For comparison on how the winter finch picture shifts further north, see orange birds in Ohio and orange birds in Michigan.

Species at a glance

Species	Season	Field mark	Zone
Northern Cardinal	Year-round	All-red with crest and black mask	Statewide
Summer Tanager	May to August	All rosy-red, no black, large pale bill	Piedmont and coast
Scarlet Tanager	May to August	Red with jet-black wings and tail	Mountain hardwoods
House Finch	Year-round	Red forehead and breast, streaked flanks	Suburbs, farms
Purple Finch	October to April	Raspberry wash, stocky, white eyebrow on female	Woodland, feeders

The Northern Cardinal is the one species that holds regardless of where or when you look. The tanagers require a May trip and attention to elevation. The finch swap at winter feeders rewards anyone patient enough to look past the House Finches. Taken together, the red birds of North Carolina are less a checklist than a calendar - one that turns on altitude, season, and where the oaks are oldest.