YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRD 



By THOMAS S. ROBERTS 



THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF AUDUBON SOCIETIES 

 Educational Leaflet No. 57 



The Yellow-headed Blackbird is preeminently a native of the Great 

 Plains, and, although in some parts of its range it invades regions not 

 strictly prairie, it belongs by right to the vast treeless plains of the in- 

 terior, and to the sparsely wooded areas immediately adjoining on the 

 east and west. Over all this region it ranges, breeding from the extreme 

 northern part of Mexico in the south to the Saskatchewan Valley. 



YELLOW-HEADED BLACKBIRDS. AND THEIR NEST 



Photographed by Dr. T. S. Roberts, Minneapolis, Minn. 



One invariable condition is necessary to induce it to establish a 

 summer residence, and that is -an abundant and permanent water-supply, 

 and associated with this must be just the kind of vegetation that is suited 

 to its rather particular tastes. Preference is given usually to a swamp 

 or slough that is very wet and having more or less open water ; never 

 meadows or marshes that are simply damp and subject to drying out. 



The tule beds of the valleys of the Rockies, the quill-reed brakes of 

 the North, and the flag swamps of the South arc alike acceptable. 

 Wherever the Yellowhead breeds it congregates in colonies, and these 

 assemblages are often of vast proportions. It is very loyal to its home- 



