Buntings and Grosbeaks on McDowell Creek

 

 The creek is a magnet!   Here is an immature Indigo Bunting having a bath, while an adult Indigo Bunting sings overhead:

Adult male Indigo Buntings, unmistakable in their iridescent blue, come to feed on the weeds that spring up along the creek.  Below an adult male feeds on Green Foxtail, Marestail, and Barnyard Grass:

The female and immature Indigos have brown feathers designed to blend in.   Here the male is shadowed by a cryptically colored female or fledgling:

In the video below, a juvenile Painted Bunting also comes to bathe in the creek:

Meanwhile, a female Blue Grosbeak, accompanied by an immature or molting male, is drawn to the creek:  

A first-summer male Blue Grosbeak practices his chip call and little bit of song from the weeds along the creek.    The clip below catches him exercising his voice while perching safely on the Jerusalem Artichoke sunflowers and the Giant Ragweed that grew up on the gravel bar: