Bronzed and Purple Grackles 313 



the eggs are white or nearly so and decorated in a haphazard way with irreg- 

 ular spots, splashes and lines. The number found in a nest ranges from four 

 to six. 



So adaptable is the Grackle that if there is no convenient limb suitable 

 for holding its nest, it will search for a cavity in some stump or tree and 

 there build the cradle for its young. Down in the pine barrens of south Florida 

 I once saw a female Grackle enter the hole made by a Flicker in a dead stump 

 10 to 12 feet from the ground. Upon climbing up and looking in I was met by 

 the open mouths of four hungry young. The trees in that section were not 

 numerous, their limbs were few, and were covered with very thin foliage. 

 So the Grackles simply took what they could find for a nesting-place, and 

 appeared to be content. 



Both parents share in the duties of caring for the young, which, like other 

 birds, demand a large amount of food, especially while still in the nest. As 

 soon as the little ones are able to care for themselves, numerous families of 

 Grackles unite and forage about the country. In the late evening these flocks 

 may be seen hurrying across fields and woodlands to some favorite roosting- 

 place which is sometimes occupied nightly for many weeks before the birds 

 begin their southern migration. 



As a rule, Grackles are not popular with farmers, and at times there are 

 great outcries against their depredations. Sometimes, like Crows, they pull 

 up the sprouting grain in the fields and very often in the late summer, while 

 the corn is in 'the milk,' numbers of them will descend on the corn field, 

 tear open the husks at the end of the ears and eat the soft kernels. Some 

 people accuse Grackles also of eating the eggs and young of other birds. 

 Audubon tells of this in his great work on the 'Birds of America,' but also 

 as is his custom, he has left us an account of the good the birds do. In his 

 interesting, poetic manner he writes: 



"No sooner has the cotton or corn planter begun to turn his land into 

 brown furrows, than the Crow-Blackbirds are seen sailing down from the 

 skirts of the woods, alighting in the fields, and following his track along the 

 ridges of newly-turned earth, with an elegant and elevated step, which shews 

 them to be as fearless and free as the air through which they wing their way. 

 The genial rays of the sun shine on their silky plumage, and offer to the plough- 

 man's eye such rich and varying tints that no painter, however gifted, could 

 ever imitate them. The coppery bronze, which in one light shews its rich 

 gloss, is, by the least motion of the bird, changed in a moment to brilliant and 

 deep azure, and again, in the next light, becomes refulgent sapphire or emerald- 

 green. 



"The bird stops, spreads its tail, lowers its wings, and, with swelled throat 

 and open bill, sounds a call to those which may chance to be passing near. 

 The stately step is resumed. Its keen eye, busily engaged on either side, is 

 immediately attracted by a grub, hastening to hide itself from the sudden 



