Blue Bunting (Cyanocompsa parellina)
Number of accepted Blue Bunting records for Louisiana = 1 as of 25th Report of the LBRC (2022)
Accepted Records
Specimen (81-14) (LSUMZ 94288) collected
20 December 1979 by SWC (with JVR, LH, and DH) on Hackberry Ridge, Johnsons
Bayou, Cameron Parish is the first record for the United States.
Reasons for believing that this is a wild bird and not an escapee are
presented in an article by Cardiff and Remsen (Auk 98(3): 621-622). Richard A.
Ryan, an expert on cage birds, subsequently examined the specimen, that of an immature female in fresh first-year plumage, and found that it lacked
any trace of the minute feather damage that occurs in all cage birds; thus,
if the bird were an escapee, it would have had to escape while still in
juvenal plumage, a virtual impossibility. The specimen was assigned to C.
p. beneplacita by Allan R. Phillips.
See also Cardiff, S. W., and J. V. Remsen, Jr. 1981. A Blue Bunting {Passerina (Cyanocompsa) parellina} record for the United States from Louisiana. Auk 98: 621-622.