A few days ago (5/30/2026), my wife and I found no painted bunting at the Sunflower Nature Park in De Soto, Kansas (see: https://ebird.org/checklist/S349840891). However, a male painted bunting was there last year on 8/12/2025 (see: https://ebird.org/checklist/S266902248). Reluntant to blame painted buntings for being unreliable migrants, we went back today, 6/2/2026, to see if any birds have returned. Sure enough, a drab female dutifully made her appearance. We were parked at (38.941926, -95.011923) to shoot the two photos at 4:51 p.m. shown below:
https://ebird.org/checklist/S351631360 So, painted buntings are beautiful and reliable. What more can one ask of a bird?
Bob I. Yang
<yangb...>
Overland Park, Johnson County
