Turdus migratorius
American Robins are large thrushes with rounded bodies, long legs and long tails. They have gray brown plumage with orange to red chests and dark heads. The females are duller in coloration than the males. Males grow black feathers during the breeding season and once the breeding season is over they lose those feathers.
During the winter when road conditions get bad enough to make me think about my personal safety driving on the interstate and other roads I enjoy being able to photograph urban birds much closer to home.
Just looking at these photos of American Robins in the deep snow made me feel a few degrees cooler and I thought they might have the same effects on other people dealing with the high temps of summer too.
Because of our wetter than normal spring it seems that the chokecherries are doing well, extremely well. Many of the chokecherry branches are bending low because of the weight of the blossoms.
When I saw this immature American Robin perched in some bushes that were starting to show the colors of autumn I knew I wanted to photograph it, so I did.
On February 16th I woke to fresh snow on the ground and I knew I wanted to see if the American Robins were still feeding in the crabapple trees close to home.
Two afternoons ago when I left the local pond to head home I saw at least 75-100 foraging American Robins in some crabapple trees and on the ground in the snow.
My best bird that morning was this adult American Robin that fluffed, preened and gobbled down some berries while perched in a Utah Serviceberry tree.
There was plenty of bird activity where chokecherry trees lined both sides of the gravel road, the most numerous birds foraging on the chokecherries were American Robins and many of them were immature birds.
In the past week I have photographed so many birds in a Wasatch Mountain canyon that I thought I would share a group of them in a photo gallery.
While photographing some waxwings a flash of movement caught my eye and I spotted an immature American Robin reaching for a berry in a Utah Serviceberry shrub, I couldn't help myself, I had to photograph this young bird too.
Yesterday in a Wasatch Mountain canyon I found a cooperative female American Robin resting on a perch on a hillside covered with sagebrush.
I was trying to photograph flickers, wrens and sapsuckers in the Targhee National Forest of Idaho earlier this month when the American Robin in the photo above appeared and softly called.
Burrowing Owls and American Robins are about the same size but they are two very different species of birds.
In early May I found this American Robin perched near Modoc Creek, Idaho and I liked the simplicity of of the background and the robin's pose.
Personally, I love to see American Robins any time of the year and to watch them searching for prey. Common? Yes, but delightful too.
I can take advantage of the sucker holes by photographing birds close to home when the sun breaks through the clouds.
American Robin juvenile photographed in my backyard in Utah as it perched above the grass. Robins are the largest and most abundant North American thrushes.