14 T Hel AUD: U_BON — BU Die 
home was miles from any water. This bird had but one mate the first year 
that I observed him, but the second year he had two wives. The birds are 
not always polygamous, but when they; are, each female has her own nest 
and all seem quite satisfied. 
The red-wings usually have from three to six eggs which are bluish- 
white or -green, spotted and marked with zigzag lines of black and purplish. 
Forbush says that some males assist in feeding the young, but probably 
this duty is left mostly to the mother birds. Some consider the male birds 
utterly irresponsible as parents; Forbush says that the male bird is vigilant 
in protection of his young. ‘Let a crow appear and the blackbird is after 
him. He will chase a marsh hawk, a bittern, or even an osprey in his 
anxiety to protect those dependent upon him. ... At sight of a man ap- 
proaching, the bird becomes hysterical and goes out to meet him, fluttering 
overhead and uttering blackbird maledictions or lamentations as long as the 
intruder remains in the vicinity of his charges.” 
Often red-wings rear but one brood a season, after which they gather 
in great flocks and forsake the marshes except that they return for roosting. 
In an autumn twilight I have seen hundreds of red-wings winging their 
way to the marshes, there to settle among the reeds and cat-tails and 
chatter and call to one another until dark. 
Red-wings may go half a mile from their nests to secure an abundance 
of caterpillars for their young. In migration they often swarm on the 
upland and in the cornfields. They have a partiality for open fields and 
plowed lands. They follow the plow, picking up grubs, worms, and cater- 
pillars. In the Northeast they are protected by law, but in some states 
there has been a bounty on their heads. 
In Birds of America F. E. L. Beal has this to say of the red-wing: 
“Examination of 1,083 stomachs showed that vegetable matter forms 74% 
of the food, while the animal matter, mainly insects, forms but 26%... 
So far as the insect food as a whole is concerned, the red-wing may be 
considered entirely beneficial. 
“Only three kinds of grain, corn, oats, and wheat, were found in appre- 
ciable quantities in the stomachs. They aggregate but little more than 
13% of the whole food, oats forming nearly half of this amount. ... The 
most important item of the bird’s food, however, is weed seed, which forms 
practically the whole food in winter and about 57% of the fare of the 
whole year. The principal weed seeds eaten are those of ragweed, barn- 
grass, and smartweed. That these seeds are preferred is shown by the 
fact that the birds begin to eat them in August, when grain is still readily 
accessible, and continue feeding on them even after insects become plentiful 
in April. The red-wing eats very little fruit and does practically no harm 
in the garden or orchard. Nearly seven-eighths of its food is made up of 
weed seed or of insects injurious to agriculture, indicating unmistakably 
that the bird should be protected, except, perhaps, in a few places where it 
is overabundant.”’ 
Notre: This article by Mrs. Ames will be continued in future issues of 
the Bulletin until the entire family has been studied. 
