Red-winged Blackbird
Red-winged Blackbird: Small blackbird with jet-black body and bright red shoulder patches edged with yellow on bottom. Runs or hops while foraging on the ground. Eats seeds, grains, berries, fruits, insects, caterpillars, spiders, snails, grubs and mollusks. Strong direct flight on rapid wing beats.
● Song:
"o-ka-leeee", "konk-a-ree"
● Foraging & Feeding:
Red-winged Blackbird: Feeds on insects, small fruits, seeds, waste grain, and small aquatic invertebrates. Runs or hops while foraging on the ground. Although regarded as a pest because it eats grain in cultivated fields, the farmer also benefits from consumption of harmful insects.
● Breeding & nesting:
Red-winged Blackbird: Three to five pale blue green eggs marked with dark brown and purple are laid in a well-made cup of marsh grass or reeds and attached to emergent vegetation or built in a marsh shrub. Incubation ranges from 11 to 12 days and is carried out by the female.
● Similar species:
Red-winged Blackbird: Tricolored Blackbird, which occurs only in Oregon and California, has white bordered red shoulder patch. Female has darker belly.
● Range & Habitat:
Red-winged Blackbird: Breeds from Alaska east across Canada to Newfoundland and south to northern Baja California, central Mexico, the Gulf Coast, and Florida. Spends winters regularly across the U.S. north to British Columbia, Great Lakes, and Pennsylvania. Preferred habitats include fresh and saltwater marshes, rice paddies, sedge meadows, alfalfa fields, and other croplands.