Bird watching in North America - Red-winged Blackbird, Agelaius phoeniceus

Length:
Wingspan:
Weight:
Longevity:
Distinctive Feature •
Similar Species • From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.
Female / Male • From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.

The red-winged blackbird (Agelaius phoeniceus) is a passerine bird of the family Icteridae found in most of North America and much of Central America. It breeds from Alaska and Newfoundland south to Florida, the Gulf of Mexico, Mexico, and Guatemala, with isolated populations in western El Salvador, northwestern Honduras, and northwestern Costa Rica.

It may winter as far north as Pennsylvania and British Columbia, but northern populations are generally migratory, moving south to Mexico and the Southern United States. Claims have been made that it is the most abundant living land bird in North America, as bird-counting censuses of wintering red-winged blackbirds sometimes show that loose flocks can number in excess of a million birds per flock and the full number of breeding pairs across North and Central America may exceed 250 million in peak years

It also ranks among the best-studied wild bird species in the world.[2][3][4][5][6] The red-winged blackbird is sexually dimorphic; the male is all black with a red shoulder and yellow wing bar, while the female is a nondescript dark brown. Seeds and insects make up the bulk of the red-winged blackbird's diet.

Passerine bird

A passerine is any bird of the order Passeriformes, which includes more than half of all bird species. Sometimes known as perching birds or — less accurately — as songbirds, passerines are distinguished from other orders of birds by the arrangement of their toes (three pointing forward and one back) , which facilitates perching . With more than 110 families and some 5,100 identified species, Passeriformes is the largest order of birds and among the most diverse orders of terrestrial vertebrates.

The passerines contain several groups of brood parasites such as the viduas, cuckoo-finches, and the cowbirds. Most passerines are omnivorous, while the shrikes are carnivorous.

The terms “passerine” and “Passeriformes” are derived from Passer domesticus, the scientific name of the eponymous species (the house sparrow) and ultimately from the Latin term passer, which refers to sparrows and similar small birds.

Perch

noun a thing on which a bird alights or roosts, typically a branch or a horizontal rod or bar in a birdcage.
• a place where someone or something rests or sits, especially one that is high or precarious: Marian looked down from her perch in a beech tree above the road.

verb [no OBJ., with ADVERBIAL OF PLACE] (of a bird) alight or rest on something: a herring gull perched on the rails for most of the crossing.

I'm out on a birding tour

I will attend to this page as soon as I am back home again.
So please come back in June/ July 2023

Range map from www.oiseaux.net - Ornithological Portal Oiseaux.net

www.oiseaux.net is one of those MUST visit pages if you're in to bird watching. You can find just about everything there

Length:

Wingspan:

Weight:

Longevity:

Distinctive Feature

•

Similar Species

•

From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.

Female / Male

•

From opus at www.birdforum.net the forum for wild birds and birding.

Female portrait

Nesting Eagles Way, Berthoud, Colorado, USA - April 2023

Male portrait

By Francis C. Franklin - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0,
https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31962828

Listen to the Red-winged Blackbird

Sound from www.xeno-canto.org

Remarks from the Recordist

Recorded with my ZOOM H5 Handy Recorder and High Pass Filter applied with Audacity

Sitting in a bush across the road. The third call is a flight call, just after the car have passed

Sound from www.xeno-canto.org

Remarks from the Recordist

Recorded with my ZOOM H5 Handy Recorder and High Pass Filter applied with Audacity

Many of them sitting in the reeds singing showing the red shoulders

Sound from www.xeno-canto.org

Remarks from the Recordist

Recorded with my ZOOM H5 Handy Recorder and High Pass Filter applied with Audacity

Sitting next to me in a tree and he don't mind me taking pictures. About 1 meter away. My Guide tell me that it is an alarm call and I don't know for what he is warning about. Obviously he is not scared of me.

Sound from www.xeno-canto.org

Remarks from the Recordist

Recorded with my ZOOM H5 Handy recorder and High Pass Filter applied with Audacity

Sitting in a tree next to the road and I stop to make a recording through the sun roof in my car

Conservation status

Least Concern (IUCN 3.1)

IUCN Red List

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

www.birdforum.net

Sighted: (Date of first photo that I could use) 8 April 2023
Location: eBird hotspot: State Forest SP - Moose Visitor Center

Red-winged Blackbird, Agelaius phoeniceus

Red-winged Blackbird
8 April 2023 - eBird hotspot: State Forest SP - Moose Visitor Center

Red-winged Blackbird
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Red-winged Blackbird
21 April 2023 - Convention Center, South Padre Island, Texas

Red-winged Blackbird
28 April 2023 - eBird hotspot: Whitby - Cranberry Marsh, Canada

Female Red-winged Blackbird
28 April 2023 - eBird hotspot: Whitby - Cranberry Marsh, Canada

Female Red-winged Blackbird
29 April 2023 - eBird hotspot: Toronto -- Centennial Park, Canada

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