368 
PASSERIFORMES 
of control. Poison is effective, but care must be taken that it is used only 
in the seasons and places where no other species have access to it. Wire 
fabric traps that are always set and will catch numbers at a time are the 
most satisfactory. A good type of such trap has been described by the 
United States Biological Survey in Farmers’ Bulletin J+9'3. 
r l he common use of the automobile and the reduction of the number 
of horses on our streets and roads have given the first real check that the 
species has received in this country since it was introduced. In consequence 
of the reduced food supply, especially in winter, the number of the species 
is considerably less than it was a few years ago, and it seems as though 
this unexpected factor has done more to keep the English Sparrow within 
bounds than all the fulminations that have been directed against it. 
FAMILY — ICTERIDAE. AMERICAN STARLINGS 
This family includes the blackbirds, orioles, and meadowlarks. They 
are closely related to the sparrows and clear differentiation cannot be made 
between them in a popular description. Most of them have rather long, 
pointed, tapering bills (Figures 461-463) and some have the middle of the 
culmen running up in a short keel on the forehead. The bobolink and 
the cowbird have quite sparrow-like bills (Figures 460 and 464), but they 
are shortened icterine rather than passerine bills. These species can also 
be separated easily by their marked colour patterns. 
494. Bobolink, skunk blackbird, le goglu. Dolichonyx oryzivorm, L, 7-25. 
Plate LXXI A. A little larger than a House Sparrow with a sparrow-like bill (Figure 460). 
Spring male: striking black and white with a cream-coloured nape and hindneck. Female 
and autumn birds of both sexes: huffy yellow, striped with dark brown on back. 
Distinctions. The spring male has a slight resemblance to the male Lark Bunting of 
the western prairies, but is white on the shoulders and rump instead of on the wings, and 
there is a large cream-coloured area on the hindneck. Females, 
juveniles, and autumn birds of both sexes are entirely different 
and might be taken for another species at this season. They 
resemble the sparrows in general coloration, especially the long- 
spurs, and particularly the autumn Smith’s Longspur. How- 
ever, the tail of the Bobolink is composed of stiff, pointed 
feathers and shows no white, and the general colour is yellowish 
and olivaceous rather than brownish. 
Figure 460 
Bobolink; about natural 
size. 
Field Marks. The striking black and white male and his 
ecstatic flight song are perfectly distinctive. The Lark Bunting 
has a remarkable flight song also, but white is restricted to 
the wings. Female and autumn bobolinks are best recognized by the yellowish tone 
of their general coloration, dark bar from eye, and light superciliary line, absence of white 
in the tail, and by their note, a short, sharp, metallic “Klink.” 
Nesting. X T est of grass, on the ground in the grass. 
Distribution. North and South America. In Canada, along the southern borders, 
in open places across the continent to the prairies. Scarce in southern British Columbia. 
The Bobolink in spring and summer is a bird frequenting hay and 
clover fields. It may be seen any summer’s day perched on the surrounding 
fences or launching into the air on quivering wings, pouring forth its song 
of ecstasy. Bater in the season the rollicking male doffs his parti-coloured 
gayness for the duller ochre and brown stripes of the female. His song is 
replaced by metallic klinks, and with hundreds of others of this species 
joined together in flocks he seeks the marshes until autumn. On leaving 
Canada for his winter home in South America he stops for a time in the 
rice fields of the Oarolinas and here he is hailed not as Bobolink, the merry 
songster, beloved for both practical and sentimental reasons, but as the 
