Northern cardinal

Cardinals eat seeds, fruit and bugs.

Their thick beaks crack open seeds. They love sunflower seeds at bird feeders.

Cardinals eat mostly seeds and fruit, such as dogwood berries, wild grapes, mulberries, blackberries, grass seeds and corn. They also eat insects like beetles, crickets and caterpillars, and they feed their chicks mostly insects.

At bird feeders, black oil sunflower seeds are a favorite. A cardinal splits the seed with its thick bill, then uses its tongue to separate the shell from the seed inside.

The diet is mainly vegetable: seeds of weeds and grasses, waste grain, buds, flowers and many wild fruits, including dogwood, wild grape, mulberry, hackberry, blackberry and sumac. Insects and other invertebrates, from beetles, crickets, katydids and cicadas to spiders, centipedes and snails, supplement it, and nestlings are fed mostly insects.

Cardinals forage mostly by hopping on the ground or in low bushes. At feeders they favor sunflower seeds, cracking the husk with the heavy bill and using the tongue to separate shell from kernel.

Boy and girl cardinals both sing.

Their song sounds like 'cheer, cheer, cheer'. Sometimes they sing together, like a duet!

In many North American songbirds only the males sing, but female cardinals sing too, often while sitting on the nest. A pair shares song phrases, and they may sing in duets. Their loud, clear whistles sound like 'cheer, cheer, cheer' or 'birdie, birdie, birdie'.

In spring, cardinals defend their territory so fiercely that they sometimes attack their own reflection in a window or car mirror. In fall and winter, they may join flocks of a dozen to several dozen birds.

Cornell notes that only a few female North American songbirds sing, but female cardinals do, often from the nest, which may tell the male when to bring food. Pairs share song phrases, and the female's song may be longer and slightly more complex. In courtship, Audubon describes the pair raising their heads and swaying while singing softly, and the male often feeding the female.

Both sexes attack reflections in spring and early summer, when territorial aggression peaks; Cornell records one female doing this almost daily for six months. Pairs may stay together through the winter, though up to 20 percent split up by the next season, and in fall and winter cardinals can form flocks of a dozen to several dozen birds.

There are lots of cardinals.

They are not in danger. They live happily in gardens and parks near people.

Northern cardinals are doing well. The IUCN Red List rates them Least Concern, and their numbers have slowly grown since 1966. Partners in Flight estimated in 2020 that about 130 million breed in the world.

Cornell explains that the spread of farms and suburbs over the last two centuries has been good for cardinals. People love them too: the cardinal is the state bird of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia.

The global assessment (IUCN, 2018) lists Cardinalis cardinalis as Least Concern. The North American Breeding Bird Survey estimates an increase of about 0.32 percent a year since 1966, and Partners in Flight (2020) puts the global breeding population at about 130 million, with a low Continental Concern Score of 6 out of 20.

Cornell attributes part of the species' success to the expansion of agricultural and suburban habitat over the last two centuries. Cardinals are the state bird of Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, North Carolina, Ohio, Virginia and West Virginia.