Even though we tend to think of ourselves as good communicators, we are far from the only members of the animal kingdom that communicate on several levels. All mammals and birds communicate with voice, body language, and pheromones. Although verbal communication is our main means of communication, that’s not the case with all animals. Birds, however, do depend heavily on song to communicate. Males (and sometimes females, too) mark their territories with song, nestlings communicate their hunger by calling out to their parents, and birds also tell others in the flock or family about danger or the availability of food. That’s exactly what this pretty little female northern cardinal (Cardinalis cardinalis) was doing when I photographed her earlier today. Her mate and at least one fledgling were off in the woods and they were calling back and forth pretty much continuously for the entire time I was watching. I don’t speak cardinal, but I think she was letting them know that food was plentiful over where we were. I watched her catch and devour two moths in less than five minutes. Between those catches, she was singing away and the others were answering. After she caught the second moth, she took off into the woods. Presumably to rejoin her family.