52 
THE BOAT-TAILED GRAKLE, OR GREAT CROW 
BLACKBIRD. 
Quiscalus 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-fiats, 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 I’acoon 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 nests at this early season. It is then that you ought to see the 
