Obviously, this bird received its name from its mournful “coo, coo, coo.” In spite of its dull coloring, this is really a handsome and unique bird. A peculiar sound comes from the wind whistling through its feathers when flying. The parents regurgitate food, making a gruel for the two babies just hatched. Later on, these birdlings are weaned to insects and seeds.
You will need:
- Soft-lead pencil colors
- Regular paper
- Card stock
- Pencil
- Black fine-tip marker
- Foam sheet
- Acrylic paints
- #20 fat brush
- On regular paper, lightly mark 1” squares. Lightly again, sketch your bird block by block. When you feel satisfied, trace over your drawing with a fine-tip black marker. Now lightly trace this with a pencil onto card stock paper.
- Carefully do the eye with a fine-tip black pen. With pencil colors, do the head and body with soft layers of dark brown, gray, and a smidgen of goldenrod. Burnish with light peach or ginger root. The resulting color should be something deeper than just tan.
- Place a soft foam sheet underneath your drawing and trace over all the wing divisions with a fine-tip stylus tool. With foam sheet still underneath, use an underhand grip to lightly sweep in layers of dark brown, black, and a hint of indigo blue on the outer wing tips. (Just watch the wing divisions snap out!) Continue on over the back and tail with the same colors, but add a smidgen of goldenrod over the back. The outer tail tips have a tiny bit of blue and black along the edges. Outline the white areas with a soft black or gray.
- This is October, and your scene needs some more color. Brightly colored autumn leaves will enhance your scene, shining in this lovely “October’s bright blue weather”! I did the leaves with paint, but pencil colors work very well. Match what you see, but don’t fuss about exactness here!
- With a #20 brush, do a chalking of blue for the sky. I placed a cloud stencil, then brushed off color to form the clouds. You can get an identical result using stamping inks instead of chalks. I prefer this method. With both methods, it is important that you do the first swiping on scrap paper to avoid ugly streaks!
