The Cardinal Nesting Preferences

Cardinals were initially discovered in the southern states. However, since 1950, they have been found also in the north and northwest areas of the U.S. notably along the Mississippi River. These days, they can be spotted in wooded areas and in the backyards of homes in the eastern section of the U.S. They like to stay in a particular location with enough food and suitable shelter for them.

Cardinals have different habitat preferences regardless of the type of vegetation. But they usually go for the thick shrubs such as the blueberry, elderberry, pokeberry, spicebush, flowering dogwood and juneberry. They have been found to nest as well in thick vines like the trumpetcreeper which make good and secure hiding places for them.

They prefer to live in gardens, woodlands, streams and mesquite areas. Being non-migratory birds, they like to stay in a mix of woodlands, hedgegrows, bush, roadsides and forest edges. Sometimes, individual birds may wander over a large area. They can also stay in the forest or old swamps as well as in cities. Generally, they abound in areas where food is aplenty with about 50 to 70 of them in a flock.

These songbirds build small cup-shaped nests on some low bush or tree about one to 15 feet above the ground, most often close to a fence, in the center of a field or inside thick shrubs. They like their nests to be near a stream where they can drink and bathe. Other times, they make nests near the house of a planter or in his garden. George Martin Adams in his “Birdscaping Your Garden: A Practical Guide to Backyard Birds and the Plants that Attract Them” pointed out that plants suitable for the cardinals’ food and shelter are hackberry, dogwood, hollies, red mulberry, wild cherry, sumac, elderberry and viburnum.