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YELLOW-HEADED TROOPIAL. 



Icterus xanthocephalus, Bonap. 



PLATE CCCLXXXVIII. Male, Female, and Yodng, 



This species was first made known as an inhabitant of North Ame- 

 rica by the naturalists of Major Long's expedition to the Rocky 

 Mountains. According to Dr Richardson, " the species ranges in 

 summer to about the fifty-eighth parallel," but has not been found to 

 the eastward of the Mississippi, where it " arrives from the southward 

 in the middle of May, and by the 20th of the same month reaches the 

 Saskatchewan, where it associates with the Redwing, and, being more 

 numerous, commits even greater havoc in the corn-fields. Mr Nut- 

 tall has favoured me with the following notice respecting it. " On 

 the 2d of May, around the Kansa (Texian) Agency, we now saw abun- 

 dance of the Yellow-headed Troopial, associated with the Cow-bird. 

 They kept much on the ground in companies, the males (at this time) 

 by themselves. In arable or loose soil they dig into the earth with 

 their bills in quest of insects and larvae, are very active, and straddle 

 about with a quaint gait, and now and then, while on the groimd, which 

 they wholly frequent, in the manner of the Cow-bird, whistle out with 

 great effort, a chuckling note sounding like ko-hukkle-ait, often varying 

 into a straining squeak, as if using their utmost endeavom* to make 

 some kind of noise in token of sociability. Their music, if such it 

 deserves to be called, is however even inferior to the harsh note of the 

 Cow-bird. Are they also polygamous ? Afterwards, in the month of 

 June, by the edge of a grassy marsh, in the open plain of the Platte, 

 several hundred miles inland, we met with the nest of this bird con- 

 taining several spotted and blotched greenish- white eggs, not much un- 

 like those of the Red-winged Icterus." To this Dr Townsend adds : 

 — " Icterus xanthocephalus inhabits the western plains of the Missouri 

 and banks of the Platte River to the Black Hills. The nest of this 

 species is built under a tussock in marshy ground, formed of fine grasses, 

 and canopied over like that of the Meadow Lark. The eggs, from two 

 to four, are of a bluish-white, covered all over with minute specks of 

 purple, largest and most numerous at the great end. It associates 



