THE BLACK-HEADED GROSBEAK 
By WILLIAM L. FINLEY 
Che Pational Association of Audubon Societies 
EDUCATIONAL LEAFLET NO. 45 
The Black-headed Grosbeak is one of the birds of my childhood. As 
long ago as I can remember, I saw him in the mulberry and the elder trees 
about my home when the fruit was ripe. I did not know his name, but I knew 
him by his thick bill, his bright colors and his high-keyed call-note. One has 
little trouble in getting acquainted with a bird of such marked individuality. 
The black head, the red-brown on the breast brightening to lemon-yellow 
below and under the wings, the black tail and wings with two white wing-bars, 
are distinctive of the male. The female iy more demurely dressed in dark 
brown and buff. But the garments are not the only distinctive features of 
the Black-headed Grosbeak. 
For several summers, I watched a pair of Grosbeaks that 
Habits lived in a clump of vine-maples on the hillside. The same 
pair, no doubt, returned to the thicket for several years. It 
seemed that I could almost recognize the notes of their song. If our ears were 
tuned to the music of the birds, could we not recognize birds by their songs, 
as we do our friends by their voices? 
One day I stopped to look for a bird that was caroling in one of the maples. 
T saw the Grosbeak mother singing her lullaby as she sat on her eggs. It looked 
to me so like a human mother’s love. Few birds sing in the home. However 
much they wish to, they are afraid. As John Burroughs says, it is a very rare 
occurrence for a bird to sing while on its nest. But several times I have heard 
the Black-headed Grosbeak do it. How the Grosbeak took up such a custom, 
I do not know, for birds in general are very shy about attracting attention 
to the nest. 
In the Grosbeak family, the Cardinal or Redbird is perhaps 
Range more familiar, since he is often seen behind the bars of a cage. 
The Rose-breasted Grosbeak is the bird of the eastern states 
while the Black-headed Grosbeak is of the West. He may be found anywhere 
from eastern Nebraska to California, and from British Columbia south to 
the plateau of Mexico. 
As a rule, he builds a loosely constructed nest of twigs, 
Nest and Eggs lined with fine roots. In the northern states, the nests are built 
in dogwoods, vine-maples and alders; while, in the South, the 
bird often nests in chaparral, willows and other trees. The eggs are three and 
four in number, and are pale blue thickly spotted with brown. 
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