Many years ago, before the fence went up between our house and the house up the hill, when our neighbor Paul still lived there and a beautiful cotoneaster bush that we all admired graced the grassy slope, there was always a memorable day sometime in winter, late December or early January, when the bush was full of berries and the cedar waxwings (Bombycilla cedrorum) came to feast and get drunk on the fermenting fruit.
Today a FB friend posted a photo of a Japanese waxwing (B. japonica):
Three, it turns out. The third is the Bohemian waxwing (B. garrulus; no relation, I'm pretty sure, to Bohemian Rhapsody—and not restricted to Bohemia, since it's one of the two North American waxwings).
Here are the cedar and Bohemian:
When I thought "more colorful" with the Japanese version, I apparently meant more red. They're all beautifully colorful.
The genus name, Bombycilla, translates to "silktail," a nod to their soft, silky plumage. Those red dots on their wings look like sealing wax, hence their common name. They are fruitivores, feeding on strawberries and cherries, mulberries and raspberries, mistletoe and dogwood berries, and of course cotoneaster fruits. They do not migrate far, unless it's a poor fruit year where they happen to be—and then they go in search. If food supplies are good, they may nest in great numbers, without any territoriality, which may explain why they have no true song. Pairing includes a ritual in which mates pass a fruit back and forth several times until one eats it. The female is the main nest builder, though both gather construction materials.
I wish we still had that cotoneaster up the hill. Though I have gotten used to the fence, which was down for a while the last few months, until it got rebuilt in a more lasting fashion. And given the state of the new neighbors' yard, and their free-range, barking dog? I guess I'd rather have the fence . . .
But I do miss the waxwings.
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