Right outsideBirds
Bald cardinals and blue jays at the feeder: molting, not sick
When: August to September
Late summer feeders turn up cardinals and blue jays with a bare black head and a normal body, which looks alarming and is not. Most are this year's young losing every head feather at once in their first molt.
Why this time of year
Molt runs between the end of nesting and migration, and the reports cluster from late summer into early fall. Birds usually replace feathers a few at a time so the skin stays covered; in blue jays and cardinals the head tract sometimes goes all at once, and it is most often a juvenile's first molt.
How to notice it
- Watch the feeder for a bird whose body looks right and whose head is bare black skin.
- Check the body feathers: a molting bird is otherwise in good shape, and a sick one is not.
- Look for the pin feathers, short and stubby, pushing back through within about a week.
- Mark the date you first see it. The head is usually covered again in about two weeks, which makes this one of the fastest visible changes in the yard.
Try this with kids: Find the bald bird, then check the same feeder in a week. How much has grown back?
a molt is the scheduled replacement of worn feathers; the bare stage is skin, not injury
Sources
- audubon.orgBald sightings run late summer to early fall, in the molt between nesting and migration; blue jays and cardinals named; the process sometimes drops all head feathers at once, most often in juveniles on their first molt; downy feathers within a week and head fully feathered within two.
- allaboutbirds.orgCornell Lab: bald blue jays are a fairly common late-summer feeder sight, cardinals molt this way too, and the head or capital tract can molt in synchrony. Not a condition to worry about.
- feederwatch.orgProject FeederWatch documents the bald stage of a molting blue jay as a known, photographed phenomenon.
In the guide for August, September