826 l The Sparrow-like Birds 



Blackbirds. Quite closely related to these are the Blackbirds, of which the 

 common Red-wing (Agelaius phceniceus) may be taken as a good example. It 

 is about nine and a half inches long, the plumage in the male being deep black 

 with the exception of a buff-bordered bright scarlet patch on the shoulders, 

 while the female is blackish, streaked with rusty, buff, and whitish. It is common 

 over eastern North America, breeding from the Gulf of Mexico to Canada, and 

 wintering from Virginia southward. They are very social birds, coming and 

 going in flocks often of thousands, and building their nests in close proximity 

 among the cat-tails and reeds of our marshes. "Mounting the topmost branch 

 of a tree not far from the nest, the male becomes an ever vigilant sentinel. His 

 rich ' kong-quer-ree,' which by association is so strongly suggestive of reedy 

 marshes, is a signal that 'all's well.' He challenges all suspicious characters 

 by an inquiring chut, chuck, and with a long, shrill alarm-note chee-e-e-e-e, circles 

 out on fluttering wings, his gorgeous crimson epaulets showing conspicuously." 

 CHAPMAN. The nest, which is attached to reeds or low bushes, is a deep, 

 substantial affair of coarse grasses and stalks and lined with finer grasses and 

 rootlets. The eggs are from three to five in number, pale bluish, curiously marked 

 with dots and irregular scrawls of dark purple or black, mainly at the larger end. 

 More or less well marked subspecies of the Red-wing are found in Florida, the 

 Bahamas, Vera Cruz, and various areas in the western parts of North America. 

 Other species are the Tawny-shouldered Red-wing (A. humilis} of Cuba, which 

 has the shoulder patch cinnamon-rufous, and the Yellow-shouldered Red-wing 

 (A. xanthomus] of Porto Rico, which has clear lemon-yellow shoulder spots. 

 Another closely allied and striking bird is the Yellow-headed Blackbird (Xan- 

 thocephalus xanthocephalus) of western and central temperate North America, 

 the male of which is black, with the head, neck, and breast yellow or orange. 



Grackles, or Crow Blackbirds. It is a common sight in the eastern United 

 States to see a dozen or twenty deep black birds that are not unlike miniature 

 Crows, walking about in parks, lawns, and fields. These are the Grackles, or 

 Crow Blackbirds (Quiscalus}, as they are often called. A nearer approach 

 shows that they have very long, graduated tails which are folded, when in flight, 

 so that a transverse section is V-shaped, and the black plumage is resolved into 

 metallic green, blue, violet, and bronze reflections. They are social birds, coming 

 often in great flocks in the earliest spring, and soon breaking up into smaller 

 parties engage in the duties of rearing the young. At this period they are ex- 

 ceedingly destructive to the eggs and especially the young of small birds, often 

 despoiling every nest within a considerable area. The nests are bulky affairs 

 of coarse grass, sedges, weed stalks, and roots often cemented with mud. They 

 are usually placed in trees, sometimes several in the same tree, occasionally 

 in bushes or in holes in trees. They lay from four to seven, usually about five, eggs, 

 which are generally bluish or bluish green, spotted, blotched, or scrawled with 

 brown or black. Three forms are known, the Purple Grackle (Q. quiscula), 

 which nests from the lower Mississippi Valley and Georgia to Massachusetts; 

 the Florida Grackle (Q. q. aglceus}, found from central Georgia to Mississippi 

 and southward to Key West; and the Bronze Grackle (Q. q. (Eneus], of the area 



