YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRD. 103 



the west side of the Mississippi, beyond which, not even a 

 straggler has been seen. These birds assemble in flocks, and 

 in all their movements, aerial evolutions, and predatory char- 

 acter, appear as the counterpart of their Red-winged relatives. 

 They are also seen to frequent the ground in search of food, 

 in the manner of the Cow-Bunting, or Troopial. In the 

 spring season they wage war upon the insect tribes and their 

 larvae, like the Red-wings, but in autumn they principally 

 depend on the seeds of vegetables. At Demerara, Waterton 

 observed them in flocks, and, as might have been suspected 

 from their habits, they were very greedy after Indian corn. 



On the 2d of May, in our western tour across the continent, 

 around the Kansa Indian Agency, we now saw abundance of 

 the Yellow-headed Troopial, associated with the Cowbird. 

 They kept wholly on the ground in companies, the males, at 

 this time, by themselves. In loose soil they dig into the earth 

 with their bills in quest of insects and larvae, are very active, 

 straddle about with a quaint gait, and now and then, in the 

 manner of the Cowbird, whistle out with great efibrt a chuck- 

 ling note sounding like ko-kukkk-'dit, often varying into a 

 straining squeak, as if using their utmost endeavor to make 

 some kind of noise in token of sociability. Their music is, 

 however, even inferior to the harsh note of the Cowbird. 

 In the month of June, by the edge of a grassy marsh, in the 

 open plain of the Platte, several hundred miles inland, Mr. 

 Townsend found the nest of this species built under a tussock 

 formed of fine grasses and canopied over like that of the 

 Sturnella, or Meadow Lark. 



While essentially a bird of the prairie, this species occurs reg- 

 ularly and in abundance in Wisconsin and Illinois. It has been 

 observed occasionally in southern Ontario, and examples have been 

 taken at Point des Monts. on the Gulf of St. Lawrence, and in 

 Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Florida. 



