cedar waxwing

Medium

Photography

Artist Notes

A lone Cedar Waxwings watches the later winter sun set. Bird photography by Bob Orsillo. According to experts on the writing of Vladimir Nabokov, this species almost certainly inspired the waxwing mentioned prominently in his novel Pale Fire. I was the shadow of the waxwing slain By the false azure in the windowpane These are the first and last lines of the poem "Pale Fire" by "John Shade", a fictional poet created by Vladimir Nabokov, for his novel Pale Fire. Waxwings are protected by law in the US and may not be kept in captivity. Waxwings are characterized by soft silky plumage. (Bombycilla, the genus name, is Vieillot's attempt at Latin for "silktail", translating the German name Seidenschwänze.) They have unique red tips to some of the wing feathers where the shafts extend beyond the barbs; in the Bohemian and Cedar Waxwings, these tips look like sealing wax, and give the group its common name (Holloway 2003). The legs are short and strong, and the wings are pointed. The male and female have the same plumage. All three species have mainly brown plumage, a black line through the eye and black under the chin, a square-ended tail with a red or yellow tip, and a pointed crest. The bill, eyes, and feet are dark. Calls are high-pitched, buzzing or trilling monosyllables (Sibley 2000, MacKinnon and Phillipps 2000).