The American Goldfinch is a symbol of summer. Impossibly yellow in May, June and July, they stand out like flashes of sunlight flitting across meadows, farmlands and treetops.
Then as the summer ends, the intriguing cycle of nature begins. Like a debutante with a closet full of clothes, the Goldfinch changes to suit the season. In the fall, it pulls out its muted colors. In the winter, it’s nearly unrecognizable as it molts into a splotchy, mostly brown outfit.
This makes the Goldfinch’s spring and summer style all the more pronounced. Despite their small size, even a lone Goldfinch will stand out for its sharp yellow profile punctuated by an orange beak. When they travel in groups of eight or ten, as they often do, you’ll also be treated to a sweet, warbling concert.
Here’s an excellent graphic from the Sibley Guides that shows the changes the Goldfinch morphs through each season.
A few summers ago, on a birding trip through the South, we stopped to camp near Tupelo, Mississippi, next to a drained lake that had been overtaken by grasslands.
The field was like a photo studio for Goldfinches, vegetarians who live for the seeds plentiful in fields like this one.
Right away we spotted the first of many, moving from reed to reed, working on dinner. They gave me one of my favorite photos, this one of a male perched on a stalk as if posing for a museum piece. (Not a farfetched idea, it turns out.)
Two Cedar Waxwings materialized above the wildlife park in Northern Virginia and pirouetted into an aerial ballet. They rose and fell, circled high above the lake, then swooped down close to the ground. They pulled all this off in precise formation like two tiny jets on military maneuvers.
They are full of energy, captivating and fascinating, says Robert Rice, a veteran scientist with the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, who wrote the center’s summary on Cedar Waxwings.
This could be the start of a great joke, but it’s just too infuriating. So many times it sounds like you’ve hit the birding jackpot only to be fooled by one wily, nondescript, gray-and-white bird.
Florida is home to a sub-species of Sandhill Crane that never migrates.
With shimmering purple and turquoise feathers, a distinctive red-and-yellow beak, a white patch on its face and bright yellow legs, this “Purple Gal” knows how to entertain a crowd. She struts slowly through the wetlands, giving you plenty of time to stand and admire.
We didn’t get a glimpse of that Purple Gallinule, but when we left Washington last month for a birding trip to Florida, the Gallinule was high on the list of species we hoped to track down. We got lucky, and so we decided to make it our Flying Lessons Bird of the Week.
We’ve found Purple Gallinules several times between South and Central Florida, glimmering like Disney princesses when the sun hits their feathers. This is one colorful female whose feathers are exactly as fancy as those of its male counterpart.
Of the 55 species in North America, the Yellow-rumped is probably the most abundant Warbler. It shows up all over the country at some point during the year and winters much farther north than most other Warblers do.
It’s easy to see the male’s deep red coloring on the cover of a Valentine’s Day card. But this goes further than feathers. Like true love, the 
I spent the rest of the afternoon looking for this seductive bird, which by then I figured out was a tanager. Shortly before the sun went down, he returned: As red as a ripe tomato, offering his striking profile for just long enough to catch a few photos. Not far away was the female tanager, identical in form but dressed all in yellow.
