108 Contributions from the Charleston Museum. 



r- 



it is "in the milk," but when the seed has sprouted. The rice 

 fields require watching from morning till night by men called 

 ' ' bird minders. ' ' A great many planters now plant the ' ' late ' ' 

 rice in June to avoid the birds. 



In the spring the Ricebirds resort to the oat fields when they are 

 "in the milk" and upon this food they become exceedingly fat. 

 Although the birds frequent the potato fields when they are in 

 bloom in May, they do not eat the potato beetle. In fact, I have 

 never seen any species of bird which eats the potato beetle. 

 This may be due to the fact that the fields are always poisoned 

 with Paris green, yet multitudes of the beetles annually escape 

 and are not destroyed by the birds. 



The Bobolink breeds from Pennsylvania to Quebec, and winters 

 to the southward of the United States, as far as Paraguay and 

 southern Brazil. 



186. Molothrus ater (Bodd.). Cowbird. 



Although the Cowbird, a winter visitant, arrives as early as 

 July 25, it is not really abundant until January and February, 

 when thousands frequent the rice plantations in company with 

 Red-winged Blackbirds, Boat-tailed, and Florida Grackles. It 

 finds an abundance of food left in the straw from which the rice 

 has been threshed. Sometimes large numbers of these birds re- 

 sort to fields which have been planted in oats and cause great 

 damage. They also frequent burnt ground. 



The Cowbird does not breed anywhere near the coast and I 

 doubt if it breeds in the State. Prof. Ridgway states^ that it 

 breeds in Wayne and Mcintosh counties, Georgia, but he does not 

 mention the authority in the citations. From my experience in 

 these counties I consider this breeding record probably erroneous, 

 for I failed to find any birds of this species there during a part of 

 May, 1891. 



The Cowbird ranges in winter as far south as Mexico. 



187. Agelaius phoeniceus (Linn.). Red-winged Blackbird. 



This well-known species is a permanent resident and is exceed- 

 ingly abundant during the autumn and winter months, when 

 hundreds of thousands congregate on the rice plantations. It is 

 also abundant in the breeding season along the coast where the 

 country is suitable to its wants. 



1 Birds of North and Middle America, Part II, 1902, 208. 



