Last year Mike wrote a superb and typically lyrical post asking “What is a Waxwing?“. I’m not going to even attempt to better his phrasing by covering the same ground he went over so eloquently - if you haven’t read his post yet click the link you’ve just hurried past immediately - but I do want to post a few photos highlighting the differences between the Bohemian Waxwing Bombycilla garrulus (which is distributed across the northern hemisphere’s boreal zone from Alaska to Siberia) and its more range-restricted American cousin the Cedar Waxwing Bombycilla cedrorum (which breeds from Canada south to California with wanderers [and Waxwings are good at wandering] making it into Central America).

Before I’d had a chance to see both species well I’d always thought that apart from some obvious plumage differences - most notably a Bohemian’s chestnut undertail coverts vs. a Cedar’s white - they were essentially pretty much very similar species. In fact, as many birders will concur, while they both share red “waxy” blobs on the secondaries (as adults), a yellow-tipped tail, brownish plumage, shaggy crests and dark “bandit” masks they can be quickly separated on structure alone. Bohemian always appears to be a chunky, Starling-like bird with a distinctively ’solid’ silhouette, whilst the Cedar is much slimmer with a longer tail giving it a surprisingly finch-like profile (I used to regularly overlook Cedars at the tops of trees on my first encounters with them as I was looking for a much heavier bird).

 

Cedar Waxwings

Bohemian Waxwings

 

Cedar Waxwings

Bohemian Waxwings

 

Looking in slightly more detail at the plumage differences the most striking of course has to be the vivid colours of a Bohemian’s wings which are patterned with golden-yellow and white vs the virtually unmarked wings of the Cedar.

 

Cedar Waxwing

Bohemian Waxwing

 

Two more plumage features that all birders looking to ID perhaps partly-hidden waxwings are the very extensive dark throats of the Bohemian Waxwing (much more restricted in the Cedar), and the rather more subtle but nonetheless reliable white upper border to a Cedar’s ‘mask’ (which is entirely lacking in Bohemian.

 

Cedar Waxwing

Bohemian Waxwing

Cedar Waxwing

Bohemian Waxwing

 

For more information on waxwings have a look at www.wordwiz72.com/waxwing.html

Waxwings and Allies Family Bombycillidae

• Bohemian Waxwing Bombycilla garrulus
• Japanese Waxwing Bombycilla japonica
• Cedar Waxwing Bombycilla cedrorum
• Black-and-yellow Phainoptila Phainoptila melanoxantha
• Grey Silky-flycatcher Ptilogonys cinereus
• Long-tailed Silky-flycatcher Ptilogonys caudatus
• Phainopepla Phainopepla nitens
• Hypocolius Hypocolius ampelinus

 

All photographs copyright Charlie Moores