A 'college' of cardinals

Wow, 8 females and 3 male Northern Cardinals flew in to eat some seeds.

This is by far the most Cardinals I have ever seen in one place.

The photos are crappy, shooting through dirty windows in the snow, but you will get the idea.

A flock of cardinals is a temporary aggregation, made possible because the red birds' strong territorial instincts are lessened in the wintertime. Outside of breeding season, a pair doesn't feel the need to jealously guard its home territory.

The Northern Cardinal can live up to 15 years in the wild.

It is the state bird of seven states-Illinois, Ohio, Indiana, Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, and North Carolina. No other bird holds this distinction.

Males that have a brighter red color appear to feed at higher rates and have greater reproductive success than males that are duller in color.

A group of cardinals has many collective nouns, including a "college", "conclave", "deck", "radiance", and "Vatican" of cardinals.

I have been seeing 3 or 4 females with 1 or 2 males off and on all winter, but this group or 'college' was a major excitement.