Gambel’s quail pair (photo from Wikimedia)

29 October 2026

With Halloween around the corner, some birds are already wearing masks even though they don’t have “masked” in their names.

• The male Gambel’s quail (Callipepla gambelii) has fancy white edges on his mask.
• Green jay (Cyanocorax luxuosus) wears overlapping masks, blue + black.
• European goldfinch (Carduelis carduelis) wears a black eye-mask (a domino) on top of a red mask.

Green Jay in Texas (photo from Wikimedia)

European goldfinch (photo from Wikimedia)

Common yellowthroat (photo by Steve Gosser)

p.s. Did you notice that the Kentucky warbler and the yellowthroat are in the same genus, Geothlypis?

According to Wikipedia: The genus name Geothlypis combines the Ancient Greek ???-/ge?- meaning “ground-” or “earth-” with ??????/thlupis, an unknown small bird. Uncertainty is baked into their name.