Rare painted bunting captivates birdwatchers in O'Hara

One of North America’s most gorgeous birds, aglow in the outrageous color combination of red, blue and yellow-green, has showed up at a bird feeder in O’Hara Township — a rarity for Pennsylvania.

About 400 bird-watchers have stopped by the O’Hara neighborhood to see the rare visitor the size of a sparrow but bursting with color amid the brownness of the dreary, mostly snowless winter.

Visitors sometimes have waited for longer than an hour to get a glimpse of this bird commonly found in the southeastern part of the country.

The painted bunting hasn’t left since it arrived Jan. 20.

Maybe that’s because the brightly colored male bird hit the bird feeder jackpot when he found the yard of Brian Shema, operations manager of the Audubon Society of Western Pennsylvania, headquartered in nearby Fox Chapel.

“The odds of the bunting showing up at a feeding station of a person that works for the local Audubon Society are astronomical,” noted Sheree Daugherty of Pittsburgh’s North Side, president of the Three Rivers Birding Club.

Shema, a professional tour guide for birding across and outside the country, has found rarities before. He found a five-striped sparrow and Montezuma quail in Arizona on a birding trip last fall. But the painted bunting in his own backyard is rarer, he said.

Those two rare finds in Arizona were expected to be there, according to Shema. But the painted bunting is not supposed to be here.

It’s anyone’s guess what brought the bird to O’Hara, Shema said. The bird is about 600 miles from its closest territory in the southernmost point of its range in North Carolina, according to the Audubon Society field guide.

A possible reason is “mirror migration,” according to Shema. Sometimes, because of a bird’s wiring, it will migrate in the exact opposite direction it should travel.

Although it’s not in the southern United States or Mexico like the other painted buntings, the O’Hara bird is equipped to spend the winter, Shema said.

The bird is eating well, not only at the feeder but from natural food sources such as seeds from hemlock cones, the ground and nearby shrubs, he said.

Shema spotted the bird from his kitchen window.

“I’ve seen hundreds of them over the years,” he said.

But priorities first: After wiping the steamed-up kitchen windows from cooking, Shema snapped a cellphone photo of the bunting. He didn’t put the word out to the birding community until he saw the bird again the next day.

Why is the bunting a repeat customer at Shema’s feeders? Simply, it likes the food. These birds are seed eaters and will frequent feeders down South.

Not to tout the Beechwood Blend, the proprietary bird food mix that the local Audubon Society sells at its Beechwood Farms, but the bird apparently likes it a lot with its two varieties of premium millet in the mix.

“The feed best replicates the seed that bird eats in the wild such as from native grasses,” he said.

Roughly, the bird visits for less than two minutes about every hour and twenty minutes, according to Shema. The bunting is remarkably bold for its size, holding its ground at the feeder when the not-so-shy house finches show up, Shema said. The current bunting visit is the third for Allegheny County, with sightings in 1995 and 2001, according to Shema, who also helps track bird populations in the region.

The sighting has proved to be an exercise in birding etiquette that has gone well, Daugherty said.

“Rare birds can send usually sedate birders and photographers into a frenzy as they rush to get a look or a great photo,” she said in a letter to birders on manners. “Always remember to show respect to the homeowner and keep the welfare of the bird in mind.”

Shema has been carefully guiding birders to his neighborhood, trying not to cause a ruckus. Birders are instructed to stay in their cars and park with a good view of his feeders and wait for the bunting to make one of its regular appearances.

The bunting should migrate back south sometime in March, he said.