Birding frenzy over painted bunting

It was drizzling rain, in near-freezing temperatures, but the birders arrived before

the sun rose, as soon as the gates to the park on the Maryland side of Great Falls had opened. With binoculars to their eyes, cameras around their necks and masks on their faces, they peered into the brush and rocks around the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal National Historical Park, desperately searching for the elusive flash of blue, red and green.

“There. There woman said.

It was a male painted bunting, a bird known for its kaleidoscope of colors: blue head, red underparts and green back. It’s a bird commonly seen in Florida and other parts of the South but rarely in Maryland.

It’s unclear why the bird made its way that far north, but the painted bunting is one of several species included in a recently published study from the National Audubon Society demonstrating that climate change is causing a shift in birds’ ranges during winter and breeding seasons.

One of the first people in the park was Jacques Pitteloud, Switzerland’s ambassador to the United States. The 58-year-old has been birdwatching for half a century. He has photographed birds all over the world and has published his pictures in several books and publications in Kenya and South Africa.

But he had always hoped to see the painted bunting someday, somewhere in the United it is,” a

States. “To see it close to D.C., that was absolutely unrealistic,” he said. At about 8:30 a.m. Sunday, a birder next to him pointed it out, and he saw it just long enough to capture it with his camera lens.

It was, he said, “exceptional.”

COURTESY OF JACQUES PITTELOUD A painted bunting perches at Great Falls Park in Maryland last month.