122 



Handbook of Nature-Study 



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Photo by A. A. Allen. 



THE RED-WINGED BLACKBIRD 



Teacher's Story 



The blackbirds are among our earliest visitors in the spring; they come 

 in flocks and beset our leafless trees like punctuation marks, meanwhile 

 squeaking like musical wheelbarrows. What they are, where they come 

 from, where they are going and what they are going to do, are the ques- 

 tions that naturally arise at the sight of these sable flocks. It is not 

 easy to distinguish grackles, cowbirds and rusty blackbirds at a glance, 

 but the red-wing proclaims his identity from afar. The bright red 

 epaulets, margined behind with pale yellow, is a uniform to catch the 

 admiring eye. The bird's glossy black plumage brings into greater con- 

 trast his bright decorations. That he is fully aware of his beauty, who 

 can doubt who has seen him come sailing down at the end of his strong, 

 swift flight, and balancing himself on some bending reed, drop his long 

 tail as if it were the crank of his music box, and holding both wings 

 lifted to show his scarlet decorations, sing his "quong quer ee-ee." Little 

 wonder that such a handsome, military looking fellow should be able now 

 and then to win more than his share of feminine admiration. But what 

 though he become an entirely successful bigamist or even trigamist, he has 

 proven himself to be a good protector of each and all of his wives and 

 nestlings; however, he often has but one mate. 



: 'The red-wing flutes his 0-ka-lee" is Emerson's graphic description of 

 the sweet song of the red-wing; he also has many other notes. He clucks 

 to his mates and clucks more sharply when suspicious, and has one alarm 

 note that is truly alarming. The male red-wings come from the South in 

 March; they appear in flocks, often three weeks before their mates arrive. 

 The female looks as though she belonged to quite a different species. 

 Although her head and back are black, the black is decidedly rusty; it is 

 quite impossible to describe her, she is so inconspicuously speckled with 

 brown, black, whitish buff and orange. Most of us never recognize her 

 unless we see her with her spouse. As she probably does most of the nest 



