Indigo Bunting in park this morning

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tomarin

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I was running in a large park near my house this morning when I saw a fairly large songbird swoop by - I only saw it from behind so I can’t say for sure what it was but it had the most amazing color of feathers: an almost unnatural, deep blue. Could it have been an indigo bunting, because I would describe it as indigo? Are there any other indigo-colored birds in the eastern United States?
 
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I joined a facebook group of bird watchers for my province. Maybe there’s a similar group where you are. Great time for bird watching with migration going on right now. Some birds are only passing through in the spring and fall and it’s great to catch one on it’s way.

Last summer we had quite a stir with indigo bunting pairs somehow staying to nest here. Unusual for us.
 
I don’t know what an Indigo bunting looks like. I will check my bird book later!

But we do have some bluebirds in our yard! They were here in ‘96 when we moved here and then gone until last year when they took up residence in a birdhouse on the top of my clothesline post! It was lovely to see them sit on the roof as I looked out my window.
 
@Irishmom2 Bluebirds of happiness?

I don’t think what I saw was a bluebird as they appear to be small goldfinch-sized birds. And what I saw had the most startling color; it made me do a double-take. Wish I had seen the front of him to be sure as bluebirds have a yellowish-orange breast.
 
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I looked it up, what a beautiful bird!

Last year, I saw a tiny little bird trying to fly into my car mirror.

It was bright yellow bird, and with a thin body, so it wasn’t a finch to my knowledge.

It was a cute little bird, I wonder if it was an escaped pet.
 
Just looked it up too. It is a beautiful bird! Well, the male is. 😏 The female is meh, lol!
 
When I first saw it, I thought, purple martin? But it wasn’t really purple, more indigo.
 
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The only other bird I can think of in the U.S. that is entirely a vivid blue is the Mountain Bluebird, and I don’t think they’re in the east. Due to extreme predation and other factors, they have become increasingly rare.
 
I looked up warbler. The bird I saw was tiny, and it’s body was pretty thin. It didn’t look like the picture of a warbler.
 
Did you see his beak? The shape and size of the beak can be an important diagnostic.
 
I think so. It was startling to see this little yellow bird. The colors were similar to the warbler picture. The beak was pointy. Not like a parakeet with a curved beak.

It’s been almost a year. I wish I had gotten a picture.
 
I know what you mean! I’ve been in that situation many times. I try to memorize as much of the bird as I can in the short moment that I see it, especially if it has different colored feathers on its chest, wings or tail (also the color and shape of the beak) because often that’s the only information separating two similar-looking species in the bird identification book at home.
 
First of all, plumage coloration is only one characteristic, and not necessarily the best one, to identify bird species. My first clue that your bird probably isn’t an Indigo Bunting is your description that it was a ‘medium sized songbird’. Buntings, by my estimation are small songbirds. Buntings are also foragers. They are either going to be seen in grassy tussocks and fields or up on power lines where they generally appear to be all black. Indigo Buntings only look blue when the sun is hitting it feathers.

The park setting seems more appropriate for Eastern Bluebird where they would be swooping down from perches and hawking insects out of the grass. They would be much more apparent on a run than Indigo Buntings and would appear all blue from the back side. They are also a medium sized songbird (a little smaller than a robin).

You can always go to eBird https://ebird.org/home and use the ‘search hotspots’ feature to see if your park is a hotspot and what birds are being recorded there. It’s a useful tool for figuring out what should be around.
 
@tad mystery solved - thank you! I had my doubts it was a bunting but the color of it matched what I imagined ‘indigo’ looked like (which is where my excitement came from, less than the bird itself).
 
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