52 



THE BOAT-TAILED GRAKLE, OR GREAT CROW 



BLACKBIRD. 



+ Quiscaltjs major, Vieill. 

 PLATE CCXX.— Male and Female. 



This elegant bird is an inhabitant of the Southern States, to the maritime 

 portions of which it is more particularly attached. Indeed, it seldom goes 

 farther inland than forty or fifty miles, and even then follows the swampy 

 margins of large rivers, as the Mississippi, the Santee, the St. John's, and the 

 Savannah. It is found in Lower Louisiana, but never ascends so far as the 

 city of Natchez, and it abounds in the south-eastern low grounds of the 

 Floridas, and in those of Georgia and South Carolina, as well as in the sea 

 islands of the Atlantic coasts, as far north as Carolina, beyond which none 

 are to be seen. 



The Boat-tailed Grakles are gregarious at all seasons of the year, and fre- 

 quently assemble in very large flocks, which, however, cannot be compared 

 with those of the Purple Grakle, or of the Red-winged Starling. They seek 

 for their food amid the large salt marshes, and along their muddy shores, and 

 throw themselves into the rice plantations as soon as the grain is fit for being 

 eaten by them. In autumn they resort not unfrequently to corn fields, and 

 the ploughed lands of the plantations, interspersed with ponds or marshy 

 places, retiring towards evening to the salt marshes, where they roost in 

 immense flocks amid the tall marsh grass [Spartina glabra), from which 

 their cries are heard until darkness comes on. 



The food of this species consists principally of those small crabs called 

 "fiddlers," of which millions are found along the margins of the rivers and 

 mud-flats, as well as of large insects of all kinds, ground-worms, and seeds, 

 especially grain. They frequently seize on shrimps, and other aquatic 

 animals of a similar nature, that have been detained at low water on the 

 banks of racoon oysters, a kind of shell-fish so named under the idea that 

 they are eaten by the racoon. In autumn, while the rice is yet in the stack, 

 they commit considerable mischief by feeding on the grain, although not so 

 much as when it is in a juicy state, when the planters are obliged to employ 

 persons to chase them from the fields. 



About the beginning of February, the males have already mated, and many 

 begin their nest at this early season. It is then that you ought to see the 



