Did you know the cardinal is the official state bird for SEVEN different states?  That's a lot of love for the red bird.

The Northern Cardinal

When you think of a cardinal, the image that pops into your head is probably of a vibrant red bird with a black mask.  And if that's what you pictured, you'd be correct! However, the cardinals with the striking red color are the males, as females look quite different.

According to Indiana DNR, a female cardinal has a duller color, and is sometimes a brownish/red.

The adult male is all red except for the black mask at the base of the bill. The markings of the female are much more subdued. She has an olive-gray back, dull red-dish wings and crest, and soft pink-brown underparts. A stout, coral-red bill and dark red feet are also common markings of both the female and male. Immature cardinals wear a plumage even browner and duller than an adult female.

The bright red color has a lot to do with the reason the cardinal became the official state bird of so many states.

Seven States Have the Northern Cardinal as Their State Bird

Seven states, including Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky, have the cardinal as the designated state bird.  When researching, I couldn't find any information on why so many states have chosen the cardinal to represent their state, except for the fact that it's such a widely recognizable bird, and it doesn't migrate for the winter so it stays in the area all year long.

Fun fact, Illinois was the first state to designate the cardinal as the official state bird! Fox 59 shares:

Indiana wasn’t the first to make the cardinal its state bird. That title actually belongs to Illinois, which declared the cardinal to be its state bird in 1929.

The cardinal became the state bird in Ohio and Indiana in the same year — 1933. Kentucky, North Carolina, West Virginia and Virginia followed suit in 1942, 1943, 1949 and 1950, respectively.

 

How to Attract Cardinals to Your Birdfeeder

When it comes to attracting these beautiful birds to your yard, you don't really have to do much.  Cardinals are a common sight at backyard feeders. Below is a photo of a cardinal stopping by my new birdfeeder (it has a camera on it, and let me tell you about how ridiculously happy this makes me).

But if you want to really entice these birds to stop by, the Indiana DNR says these are some of their favorite foods:

Some of their favorites include pokeberry, poison ivy fruit, elm buds, box elder seeds, ragweed seeds, sunflower seeds, muskmelon seeds and corn. In winter, cardinals will frequent backyard feeders and will forage with mixed flocks of dark-eyed juncos, American tree sparrows, purple finches, rufous-sided towhees and other seed-eating species.