Male blue, tinged with verdigris-green, on the head approaching to ultramarine; quills and tail-feathers dusky, edged with greenish-blue. Female yellowish-brown above, paler beneath. Young like the female. Male, in the first autumn, of a lighter and duller blue than in the adult, the feathers of the upper parts tipped with brown, of the lower with yellowish, in the second year nearly as in the adult, but with the smaller coverts dull brown.
Male, 51/4, 71/2.
Distributed throughout the United States during summer. Abundant. Migratory.
Indigo Bird, Fringilla cyanea, Wils. Amer. Orn. v. i. p. 100.
Fringilla cyanea, Bonap. Syn. p. 107.
Indigo Bird, Nutt. Man. v. i. p. 473.
Indigo Bird, Fringilla cyanea, Aud. Orn. Biog. v. i. p. 377; v. v. p. 503.
171. 3. Spiza amœna, Say. Lazuli Painted-Bunting.—Lazuli Finch.
Plate CCCXCVIII. Fig. 1. Male. Plate CCCCXXIV. Fig. 1. Female.
Male with the head, neck, and upper parts, light greenish-blue, the fore part of the back duller; loral space black; wings and tail dusky, the feathers margined with blue; two white bands on the wing; on the fore part of the breast a broad band of yellowish-red, the rest of the lower parts white. Female with the upper parts light yellowish-brown, the rump greenish-blue; fore parts pale yellowish-red, fading behind into white.
Male, 51/2; wing, 31/12.
From the Arkansas to the Columbia River. Never seen near the Atlantic coast. Plentiful. Migratory.