I have a friend who said he’d like to shoot every Desert Cardinal that he sees. I understood that by Desert Cardinal he meant the phainopepla (Phainopepla nitens). Phainopeplas are not related to cardinals; their nearest common ancestors are waxwings.
My friend’s dislike of these birds is because their diet consists mainly of mistletoe berries; they excrete the mistletoe seeds, thereby spreading the parasite to other tree branches.
Phainopeplas have digestive tracts specialized for eating mistletoe fruit. The berries are low in nutrients, so the birds have to consume lots of them; each bird may eat more than a 1,000 berries in a day. Phainopeplas rarely drink water. Instead, they get the water they needs from their diet of mistletoe berries.
They also eat insects, you will see them perch high in trees and shrubs and catch insects on the wing.
There are some in Tucson who think that every piece of mistletoe should be removed, others think that it should be untouched so that the berries continue to be food for the birds.
I say leave the mistletoe unless a tree gets heavily infested. Healthy trees are able to tolerate a few mistletoe plants with little harmful effect. Trees that are heavily infested with mistletoe may become less vigorous, stunted, and can possibly be killed.
Let’s continue to enjoy this active little bird by not depleting its source of food. This symbiotic relationship has been going on long before we settled here — long may they continue!
The name “Phainopepla” comes from the Greek for “shining robe,” a fitting characterization of the shiny, jet-black plumage of the adult male.
Female Phainopepla's do not have the glossy black coloring of the males.
