Red-winged blackbirds sing a song that spring is here
Editor’s note: This following edition of Nature News is a 2017 column, with 2024 updates, including a reference to our most recent snow storm. An internet outage prevented Susan Pike from writing a new piece this week.
Early last week, spring was here. The weather was relatively warm. Frogs and salamanders were up and about. The dawn chorus was in full swing. The dogs and us humans were tracking mud throughout the house. Then suddenly, with typical New England fickleness, it was winter again. However, a quick walk around my neighborhood was enough to reassure me that spring is still here. The birds that have been arriving in the north are still here, just a bit subdued by all that ice.
Red-winged blackbirds appeared in my neighborhood marsh almost a month ago. These were mostly males, who arrive early to establish territory, perching in the cattails, on telephone wires and stream-side shrubs, singing from any high place they could find while simultaneously displaying those beautiful red-and-yellow shoulder patches that give this bird its name.
Red-winged blackbirds are one of the most abundant birds in North America and are probably the most well-known of the blackbirds. The males are glossy black with those colorful shoulder patches. They like to hang out up high and display. The females have a subtle beauty−brown and streaky − they look like a large, stream-lined sparrow. While the males are displaying, the females are busy creeping through the undergrowth collecting food (the majority of their diet is insects in the summer, seeds in the winter) and building the nest. The nests are works of art (as are most nests). The female starts by weaving platforms of wet vegetation between reeds or low shrubs upon which she builds up layers of wet leaves and decayed wood plastered with mud to make a bowl that she lines with dry grasses (Cornell Lab of Ornithology).
I have never knowingly seen a redwinged blackbird nest but naturalist friends have warned me about trying to get too close during breeding season. Both males and females defend the nest with temerity and will not hesitate to dive bomb and peck at your head. You will often see red-winged blackbirds chasing potential threats much larger than themselves — hawks and owls in particular — they are notoriously bold in defense of their territory.
Males arrive at the breeding site first to establish territories that are instrumental in attracting females. Territories with dense vegetation so that nests can be hidden from predators and abundant food are the best. Dominant males usually get the prime territory. Once their territory is established, males attract females with their mellifluous calls and flashy epaulets. The females chose males based on the attributes of their territory, males with especially poor territories might end up with no females, while males with choice territory often attract more than one female. This is called polygyny, the type of polygamy where males have many female mates. As many as 15 females have been found nesting in the territory of one male! However, many of these females also mate with males from outside their territory. Studies have found that often 25-50% of nestlings in a given territory had not been sired by the territory-holder.
Red-winged blackbirds are one of the most happy-sounding harbingers of spring. If you aren’t familiar with their liquid song, go to a marsh right now and listen, if I can recognize it anyone can. Ornithologist Frank Michler Chapman (1912) wrote this about how great it is to hear those first red-winged blackbirds of spring “A swiftly moving, compact band of silent birds, passing low through the brown orchard, suddenly wheels, and, alighting among the bare branches, with precision of a trained choir breaks into a wild, tinkling glee. It is quite possible that in the summer this rude chorus might fail to attract enthusiasm, but in the spring it is as welcome and inspiring a promise of the new year as the peeping of frogs or the blooming of the first wild flower.” Susan Pike, a researcher and an environmental sciences and biology teacher at Dover High School, welcomes your ideas for future column topics. Send your photos and observations to spike3116@gmail.com. Read more of her Nature News columns at Seacoastonline.com and pikeshikes.com, and follow her on Instagram @pikeshikes.