This year’s batch of young cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis) have been unusually stubborn about moving away from home, much to Poppa’s dismay. Usually by this time of the year the youngsters have moved on to start claiming their own territories, but this year most of them are still here. I can no longer distinguish them from their parents except by their behavior. Poppa seems to spend most of his time running all other cardinals off from the feeding station, except, of course, for Momma. The youngsters are still definitely submissive to both older birds. Momma seems to have no issues with the youngsters, but I can tell her from the younger females by their submissiveness. The young male in this image was sitting a little ways away from the feeding station, waiting for an opportunity to go eat once Poppa finished. It actually wasn’t misty outside, but rather raining lightly. The way I processed the photo made it look kind of misty, so I went with that.

Creating this image was a lot of fun for me. It took some unusual processing techniques, some creative vision, and quite a bit of drawing to get to the finished product. These are my favorite projects to do, and it was nice to have some time to do it in. Now it looks as though we have another major hurricane headed our way, so I thought I should get it posted while I still can!