But the female cardinal does have a crest. ... Plumage is a term that refers to the characteristics of a bird's feathers. Shown here is the normal plumage of an adult northern cardinal.

Q Lately I've seen a mangy-looking female cardinal at my Roseville feeder. She's missing neck feathers and has a scraggly crest. She's sometimes accompanied by a male without any feathers on its head.

In forests far from urban areas, female cardinals mate with the males with the brightest red feathers. The brighter the feathers, the healthier the bird. But in urban areas, female cardinals are ...

As it turns out, the easiest way to tell the difference between a male and female cardinal lies in the bird's coloring. As is ...

A female and male northern cardinal. | Diana Cooper/GettyImages. For the remainder of this article, we’ll be focusing on the northern cardinal, the most famous species in the United States.But ...

There are two types of cardinals: the spring, summer and fall cardinals—and they are beautiful—and there are the winter cardinals—and they are spectacular.

At the end of January, I heard a northern cardinal sing. Birdy, birdy, birdy. What cheer, cheer, cheer. A crimson-red male sat at the top of the tree and sent out his advertisement to a nearby female.

Peggy Guthrie of rural Long Grove, Iowa, snapped this photo of an unusual female northern cardinal sitting in her weeping mulberry tree. I forwarded it to Steve Hager, an associate professor of ...

Northern cardinal fun facts: The northern cardinal is the official bird of seven different states, including North Carolina. The oldest known cardinal was a female who lived for 15 years and 9 months.