Diet of the Cedar Waxwing

The cedar waxwing (Bombycilla cedrorum) lives across most of North America, spending summers as far north as upper areas of Canada and wintering in the southern states and Mexico. The cedar waxwing is a striking bird with a crest, olive-brown coloring and a black facial mask. The bird has distinct yellow across the tip of the tail and some of the wing feathers have a wax-like red appendage. The diet of the cedar waxwing is unlike that of the vast majority of birds in America.

  1. Types

    • The bulk of the cedar waxwing diet consists of types of fruits and berries. The summertime diet includes strawberries, dogwood berries, raspberries, mulberries and serviceberries. The waxwing's fondness for the berries of cedar trees in their winter haunts in southern climes gives it its name. Among the other fruits the bird consumes are those of mountain ash, hawthorn, crabapple and madrone.

    Fruit Diet

    • Few North American bird species can survive for months by consuming little else but fruit, but the cedar waxwing can. Most fruit-eating birds will regurgitate the seeds, but not the waxwing, a bird that allows the seeds to pass through their system. The Cornell Lab of Ornithology reports that sometimes a cedar waxwing gets into a drunken state from eating large numbers of berries that are overripe, with such fermented berries able to kill the birds in some instances.

    Insects

    • The cedar waxwing will catch insects to add some protein into its diet. The birds will often show up along the banks of rivers and position themselves in the branches. The cedar waxwing will quickly fly out from its perch and snap bugs from the air to eat. Insects like mayflies, stoneflies, dragonflies and moths fall victim to the cedar waxwing in this manner.

    Effects

    • Ornithologists noticed that in the 1960s, the cedar waxwing populations in the Northeast and in southeastern portions of Canada began to develop orange tips on their tails as opposed to the normal yellow. This came about due to the birds consuming the various pigments present in the fruit of a non-native species of honeysuckle called Morrow honeysuckle, a type of plant hat made inroads into the countryside after escaping cultivation. Those waxwings that digest large amounts of these berries as tail feathers emerge will have their tail feathers take on the orange shade as an effect.

    Behavior

    • The cedar waxwing has an unusual habit, reports the "National Audubon Society Field Guide to Birds." The waxwings will sit next to each other on a branch where foods such as apple blossoms and berries exist. One will pick the morsel and pass it to the next bird, which in turns passes it to the next. The food goes down the line until one of the waxwings decides to gobble it down.