Northern Cardinal in August

August feels like summer but the year has turned. Southbound migration is quietly underway, many adults are molting into fresh plumage, and family groups are breaking up. Late nesters are still feeding young in the North while southern birds are already drifting toward wintering grounds.

For the Northern Cardinal specifically, August is a summer month inside the nesting season — one of the most active and demanding periods of this bird's year. Across the 44 states and provinces where cardinals occur, what the bird is doing this month depends heavily on latitude — the details below break it down by band.

Southern states

absent

Mid-latitudes

year-round resident

Northern states & Canada

absent

In August, cardinals are absent in the South, year-round resident across the mid-latitudes, and absent in the northern states and Canada. That north–south split is the defining feature of this month: where you live changes which version of this bird you're looking at.

August is inside the Northern Cardinal nesting season — about a month earlier in the South and a month later in the North. Nest: open cup built by the female in dense shrubs, vine tangles or saplings, usually 1–15 ft up. Clutch 2–5 eggs, incubation 11–13 days, 1–3 per season.

The southern nesting season has already wound down, but northern pairs are still raising young — the whole season shifts later as you go north. During the nesting months, adults switch to protein-rich foods for their young, become more secretive around the nest site, and often visit feeders in quick, purposeful trips rather than lingering.

• Beetles, caterpillars, grasshoppers and cicadas
• Wild grape, dogwood and blackberry fruit

Cardinals feed most actively at dawn and dusk and rarely use small-perch tube feeders. Place feeders within 10–15 ft of dense shrub cover they can retreat to.

Molting birds look scruffy and often skulk — don't be surprised if familiar visitors briefly vanish. Keep water fresh in the heat.

Full Northern Cardinal diet guide → · Best feeder for cardinals →

In August, the best watching is around food rather than the nest — adults make repeated foraging trips and are most visible at dawn and dusk. Give nesting birds space: if a bird is carrying food or scolding you persistently, you're close to a nest and should back off.

The state guides below show exactly where in your region cardinals are expected this month and which native plants hold them in a yard.

AlabamaArizonaArkansasConnecticutDelawareFloridaGeorgiaHawaiiIllinoisIndianaIowaKansasKentuckyLouisianaMaineMarylandMassachusettsMichiganMinnesotaMississippi