310 POULTRY AND WILD BIRDS 
Grackles are our largest perching birds. The family includes some of 
our finest singers, as the bobolink, meadowlark, and oriole; but some 
species have no voice for music. With the exception of the orioles they 
live in flocks after the breeding season; some® | ' | 
of them even nest in colonies. They feed 
on seeds, worms, and insects, and the small 
amount of grain they take amounts to nothing 
compared with the good they do. 
494 Bobolink. Length 7} inches. 
A wonderful singer from time of arrival in 
spring till July. Renders his bubbling, frolic- 
some song from a tall weed, a bush, or on the 
wing. He inhabits low, marshy areas, but is 
occasionally found in uplands for a short 
season. Many birds are lighter on the under 
side than above, but Robert of Lincoln has 
his clothes on the wrong way, for his black 
BoBoLink suit is marked with white on shoulders and 
lower back, and golden brown on the nape of 
the neck. Female (also male in autumn) looks much like an olive 
colored, streaky sparrow. S.R. 
495 Cowbird. Length 8 inches. 
A small blackbird commonly seen in pastures near cattle but also in 
woods and elsewhere. The male is glossy greenish black, with brown 
head and neck. Female, dark brown- 
ish gray. Cowbirds have only a 
feeble, guttural note. They live the 
life of hoboes, and are outcasts in 
bird society, the only birds we have 
that neither build nests nor take 
care of their young. The female lays 
her eggs in the nests of other species 
and these usually hatch and rear the 
young cowbirds, who crowd out the rightful occupants of the nest. 
What conduct could be more contemptible! No doubt their keeping 
company with cattle is due to the same: lazy disposition: they find 
CowBIRD 
