Join BirdNote tomorrow, November 30th!
Illustrator David Sibley and actor H. Jon Benjamin will face off in the bird illustration battle of the century during BirdNote's Year-end Celebration and Auction!
Spark Bird: Christian Cooper’s Red-Winged Blackbird
An Emmy-winning host and bestselling author shares how he discovered birds.
© Jen Goellnitz
Christian Cooper wasn’t always interested in birds. His parents were teachers, his dad a science teacher, so nature was always part of his life. When he was a kid, his parents made him take a woodshop class, where he had to build something. So he decided to build a birdfeeder and hang it in his backyard.
BirdNote®
Spark Bird: Christian Cooper’s Red-Winged Blackbird
Written by Jonese Franklin
Jonese Franklin: This is BirdNote.
Christian Cooper is host of the National Geographic show Extraordinary Birder and author of the memoir Better Living Through Birding. But, as a kid, Christian says he wasn’t interested in birds… until his parents made him take a woodshop class.
Christian Cooper: I had to build something, so I built a bird feeder and I put it up in the backyard.
Jonese Franklin: Christian filled the feeder with cracked corn. And then…
Christian Cooper: This bird shows up, all black except for this patch of red at the wings.
Jonese Franklin: At first, Christian thought he discovered a new species of crow.
Christian Cooper: And I was thrilled with my pre-teen scientific prowess. And then I found out it was a Red-winged Blackbird.
[Red-Winged Blackbird song, ML12007]
Oops! Um, but still to this day to this day, one of my favorite birds, and they are the first sign of spring for me, because growing up on Long Island, they would all depart en masse. And I would get mildly depressed in the course of the winter.
And then I would hear, sometime in like, March, Okarie!
[Red-Winged Blackbird song, ML12007]
And I'd be like, They're back! They're back! Thank God they're back! Spring is here!
[Many Red-Winged Blackbirds, ML110263341]
Jonese Franklin: For BirdNote, I’m Jonese Franklin.
###
Senior Producer: Mark Bramhill
Producer: Sam Johnson
Managing Editor: Jazzi Johnson
Content Director: Jonese Franklin
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Red-winged Blackbird ML12007 recorded by Richard W. Simmers. Red-winged Blackbird ML110263341 recorded by Dave Slager
BirdNote’s theme was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
© 2025 BirdNote January 2025
Narrator: Jonese Franklin
ID# ChristianC-01-2024-01-27 ChristianC-01
Jonese Franklin
Writer NarratorSights & Sounds
