Isolated in my apartment during the COVID-19 pandemic, there was not much to do aside from school work. I tried to keep myself busy inside during the dark winters with chores and tending to my plants, which was where I spotted two little birds sitting on my window sill. These were winter wrens, typically solitary birds who creep along woodland underbrush, and may roost in groups in the winter time.

How odd for these two to meet up on the third floor of my apartment? Breeding season wasn’t until at the earliest April and it was the dead of winter. Still, I looked out my window at them on their rendezvous.

While there has been no documented evidence of homosexual behavior in this particular species, they are still curious little creatures compared to other birds. Unlike birds like the peacock or the bird-of-paradise, or even the cardinal or robin, the winter wren does not have such significant sexual dimorphism. While males are slightly larger or have longer wings and tails, even to the trained eye it can be difficult to distinguish a male from a female winter wren by looking at them. Behaviorally, in most bird species, it is the female bird that is responsible for building the nest and tending the nestlings, but among winter wrens, the male wren builds multiple nests in his territory and presents them to the females for her to choose which to lay her eggs. While they spend most of their time as solitary birds, both the male and female winter wrens feed their nestlings after they hatch.

The winter wrens don’t seem to follow “typical” sexual trends for birds, whether it is dimorphic traits or in certain behaviors of theirs. Perhaps there is something more to these two wrens meeting each other away from the underbrush in the winter time?