I02 AMERICAN OBNITHOLOGY. 



RED^WINGED BLACKBIRD, 



A. O- U- No. 498. (Agelaius phoeniceus.) 



RANGE. 



The Red-winged Blackbird and its subspecies are found throughout 

 the United States and Canada from the Great Slave Lake southwards. 

 The American Ornithologists' Union separates the Redwing into the 

 following sub-families: 498a. Sonoran Red-wing {A. p. sonoriensis,) 

 whose range is the southwestern portion of the United States; 498b. 

 Bahaman Red-wing {A. p. bjyanti,) whose range is the Bahamas, 

 Southern Florida, and the Gulf coast of Louisiana. Ridgway, in Bulle- 

 tin No. 50 of the United States National Museum, has still further di- 

 vided the Red-wing family into: Florida Red-wing {A. t>. floridajms,) 

 Florida Peninsular (except the Keys,) Valley of Southern Texas; 

 Northern Red-wing {A. p. fortis,) interior districts of British America; 

 San Diego Red-wing {A. p. neictralis,) southern Calif., and southern 

 portions of the Rocky Mt., plateau; Northwestern Red-wing {A. p. 

 cauri?ius,') British Columbia, Western Wash., Oregon, and Northern 

 Calif. These subspecies differ from the common Red-wing of the east 

 only very slightly in the matter of size, and in general are satisfactory 

 only to the one who discovers them. 



DESCRIPTION. 



Length, 9.25; extent, 14.5: tail, 3 in. Eye, brown. Bill and feet, 

 black. With the exception of the shoulders, the plumage is entirely 

 black, and more or less glossy. The lesser wing coverts are a bright 

 scarlet or vermillion, and the middle coverts and sometimes the tips of 

 the lesser are a buffy white, thus making the buffy patch nearly equal 

 in width to the vermillion In the winter the buffy portion of the wing 

 is deeper in shade and the edges of many of the black feathers are 

 tinged with rusty. Female: Above dusky stre-aked with paler; head 

 with buffy or salmon colored median stripe and superciliary line. 

 Wings and tail dusky, the feaihers narrowly edged with whitish. Chin 

 and throat whitish, the latter sometimes tinged with salmon color; rest 

 of under parts are whitish streaked with dusky or black. Immature 

 male: Black; the back streaked with paler and the feathers edged 

 broadly with rusty. Under parts streaked as in the female; lesser wing 

 coverts inclined to be orange rather than the scarlet of the adult male. 



