Scarlet Tanager Female by David Whited

Scarlet Tanager Female

David Whited

Scarlet Tanager Female

Digital photography

Inv: MM-1576

The female Scarlet Tanager (*Piranga olivacea*) looks quite different from the brilliant red-and-black breeding male, sporting instead an olive-yellow body with dusky greenish-gray wings and tail, a coloration that provides effective camouflage while she incubates eggs and raises young in the forest canopy; found in mature deciduous woodlands across the eastern United States and southern Canada during breeding season, she forages for insects, spiders, and occasional fruit high in the treetops, and shares the species' relatively harsh, burry song phrases (though she sings less often than the male) as well as its distinctive "chip-burr" call note used for communication between mates.