RED-WINGED BLACKBIRD 



391 



The beauty and song of the male bird are but transient quali- 

 ties; for after the breeding season he loses his fine clothes, becomes 

 dull olive colored, streaked with black, like the female and young. 



Relation to Agriculture. In the fall these birds fly in flocks 

 southward to wild rice marshes and cultivated rice and grain fields. 

 They go as far as South America for winter. At night one fre- 

 quently realizes flocks of these birds are passing by hearing their 

 metallic "chink" in the darkened sky above. As "reed birds" 



FIG. 385. Bobolink, male and female. (After Fuertes.) 



or "rice birds," they find their way into the markets of the East 

 and South, fattened by voracious feeding in the rice fields. While 

 in the North they eat large numbers of injurious insects. 



Red- winged Blackbird. However injurious the group of black- 

 birds becomes in late summer and fall, in the spring and early 

 summer they almost or quite pay for their depredations by con- 

 suming large numbers of injurious insects. The red-winged black- 

 bird is a welcome arrival in the early spring, as it returns from its 

 winter migration. Its really melodious note is tuneful comfort to 



