WESTERN TANAGER

Piranga ludoviciana

Bird Spotting: The male western tangier has a red head with bright yellow wing shoulders and belly. Wings are black with white and yellow wing bar markings. The female bird is a yellowish green on top with gray wings. The rump is yellowish.

Habitat: The western tangier makes its home in open coniferous and mixed forests.

Nesting: Three to five speckled bluish-green eggs are laid in a frail, shallow saucer nest constructed of small roots, weeds and bark. Nests can be found lashed to a branch of a tree, usually at a low elevation.

Bird Bite: The bright red pigment called rhodoxanthin is rare in birds and does not come naturally to the western tangier. Eating insects that have ingested plants with this pigment gives the western tangier its distinctive red face.

There were traditionally about 240 species of tanagers, but the taxonomic treatment of this family's members is currently in a state of flux. As more of these birds are studied using modern molecular techniques it is expected that some genera may be relocated elsewhere. Already species in the genera Euphonia and Chlorophonia, which were once considered part of the tanager family, are now treated as members of Fringillidae, in their own subfamily (Euphoniinae). Likewise the genera Piranga (which includes the Scarlet Tanager, Summer Tanager, and Western Tanager), Chlorothraupis, and Habia appear to be members of the Cardinal family, and have been reassigned to that family by the AOU.