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  Profile

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  In flight

Songbirds

Western Tanager

Piranga ludoviciana

• uncommon
• 72 km/h
• Least Concern

Yellow body, red face like it walked through fire. Carries summer up into Rocky Mountain forests.

Population

~15 million mature individuals, increasing (BirdLife International/Partners in Flight, 2011 est., cited in BirdLife DataZone factsheet)

Habitat

Breeds in open coniferous and mixed coniferous-deciduous montane forests (roughly 1,600-3,050 m elevation, up to ~10,000 ft) across western North America, favoring Douglas-fir, ponderosa pine, and lodgepole pine stands, plus forest edges, burns, wetlands, and suburban parks/gardens; uses lowland woodlands, riparian corridors, desert oases, and orchards during migration; winters in pine and pine-oak woodlands, subtropical/tropical moist montane forest, scrub forest, forest edge, and coffee plantations in Mexico and Central America

Fun fact

The Western Tanager's brilliant red head coloring comes from a pigment called rhodoxanthin that it obtains from its diet (likely insects that themselves feed on plants) rather than synthesizing it directly, unlike most other red-plumaged birds.

Range

Breeds from southeastern Alaska and western Canada south through the western United States (east to western Texas) to northern Baja California/Mexico border; winters from central/southern Mexico south through Guatemala, El Salvador, Honduras, Nicaragua to central Costa Rica and Panama, with some remaining in southern California; vagrant records reach the eastern US and Caribbean; full migrant with breeding EOO ~6,540,000 km² and non-breeding EOO ~2,220,000 km² (BirdLife DataZone)

Diet

Primarily insectivorous (~82% insects including wasps, ants, termites, stinkbugs, cicadas, beetles, true bugs, grasshoppers, crane flies, dragonflies, caterpillars, scale insects, sawflies), supplemented with fruit (~18%, e.g. hawthorn, wild cherries, raspberries, mulberries, elderberries, serviceberries), especially in fall/winter; forages by foliage-gleaning and hawking

Size

0.175 m

Wingspan

0.29 m

Lifespan

8 years