90 AGRICULTURAL COLLEGE OF MICHIGAN. 



horse hair from mane and tail of a horse" (Prof. J. W. Simmons); nests usually at the 

 ends of limbs of tall trees (it often selects elms or the top-most limbs of orchard trees); 

 eggs four to six, pinkish white or bluish white, scratched with brown; feeds on insects 

 (will even eat the large tomato worm) and fruit; beautiful bird; sweet singer; next to 

 the Scarlet Tanager this is the most showy of our common birds. I have seen these 

 birds eat the young bark lice from linden trees in the spring, and have seen them 

 driven away by the bees and wasps that come for the honey-dew. 



Genus SCOLECOPHAGUS Swain. 



213-509-(331). Scolecophagus carolinus (Miill). * Rusty Blackbird; Rusty 



Grackle. 



Abundant throughout the state; migrant; " only a migrant at Ann Arbor" (Dr. J. 



B. Steere); observed at Sault Ste. Marie by A. H. Boies; E. E. Brewster has taken it at 



Iron Mountain; "Mackinac Island" (S. E. White); "Keweenaw Point" (Kneeland); 



"probably breeds" (Gibbs' Birds of Michigan); may possibly breed in Northern 



Peninsula. 



Genus QUISCALUS Vielli,. 



214-511d-(337). Quiscalus qniscnla seneus (Ridgw.). * Bronzed Grackle: 



Bronzed Crow Blackbird; Crow Blackbird; Common Blackbird. • 



March to September; exceeding abundant; throughout the state; "often in cities" 



(Geo. D. Sones); often in immense flocks especially in spring and fall; "decreasingly 



common in Monroe County" (Jereme Trombley); "Mackinac Island" (S. E. White); 



common at Iron Mountain " (E. E. Brewster); breeds; nests in May and June in large 



coarse nests in swamps, in bushes usually near the ground — R. H. Wolcott has found 



them in evergreens forty feet from the ground; eggs four to six, rarely seven, light blue 



to light brown, streaked and Bpecked with brown and black; feeds on insects, especially 



white grubs, and pulls up corn and eats corn from the ear; Prof. Jas. Satterlee once 



found a nest in a hole in an old dead tamarack, and R. H. Wolcott reports the same 



from Ann Arbor, where the nest was in an old stub standing in the river. Dr. M. 



Gibbs writes me that he finds such nesting common in new regions where old trees are 



abundant. 



Family FRINGILLIDiE. Finches, Sparrows, etc. 



Feed on seeds and insects; our native species all beneficial. Many species are 

 sylvan, while others frequent the cleared fields. 



Genus COCCOTHKADSTES Beiss. 



Evening Grosbeak, reduced. 



