Thursday, May 2, 2019

Return of the red-winged blackbird #phenology

Irregularly, a male red-winged blackbird will visit our bird feeders. Some years one shows up early in May. Other years pass with no appearance at all at the feeders. A few moments ago, one landed on the sunflower feeder. The first few times this happened, it freaked us out. We had never heard of red-winged blackbirds at bird feeders.

red-winged blackbird and red-bellied woodpecker on feeder
red-winged blackbird and red-bellied woodpecker on feeder
Photo by J. Harrington

The Cornell Lab of Ornithology makes no mention of feeders in their overview of the feeding habits of blackbirds:
Red-winged Blackbirds eat mainly insects in the summer and seeds, including corn and wheat, in the winter. Sometimes they feed by probing at the bases of aquatic plants with their slender bills, prying them open to get at insects hidden inside. In fall and winter they eat weedy seeds such as ragweed and cocklebur as well as native sunflowers and waste grains.
red-winged blackbird on tray feeder
red-winged blackbird on tray feeder
Photo by J. Harrington

 Another fascinating, but depressing, feature of the photo immediately above, taken May 5, 2015, is the amount of green in the background. This year, a similar photo would not show even a hint of green leaves, unless something truly miraculous occurs over the next two days, something not envisioned by Wallace Stevens.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird



I
Among twenty snowy mountains,   
The only moving thing   
Was the eye of the blackbird.   

II
I was of three minds,   
Like a tree   
In which there are three blackbirds.   

III
The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.   
It was a small part of the pantomime.   

IV
A man and a woman   
Are one.   
A man and a woman and a blackbird   
Are one.   

V
I do not know which to prefer,   
The beauty of inflections   
Or the beauty of innuendoes,   
The blackbird whistling   
Or just after.   

VI
Icicles filled the long window   
With barbaric glass.   
The shadow of the blackbird   
Crossed it, to and fro.   
The mood   
Traced in the shadow   
An indecipherable cause.   

VII
O thin men of Haddam,   
Why do you imagine golden birds?   
Do you not see how the blackbird   
Walks around the feet   
Of the women about you?   

VIII
I know noble accents   
And lucid, inescapable rhythms;   
But I know, too,   
That the blackbird is involved   
In what I know.   

IX
When the blackbird flew out of sight,   
It marked the edge   
Of one of many circles.   

X
At the sight of blackbirds   
Flying in a green light,   
Even the bawds of euphony   
Would cry out sharply.   

XI
He rode over Connecticut   
In a glass coach.   
Once, a fear pierced him,   
In that he mistook   
The shadow of his equipage   
For blackbirds.   

XII
The river is moving.   
The blackbird must be flying.   

XIII
It was evening all afternoon.   
It was snowing   
And it was going to snow.   
The blackbird sat   
In the cedar-limbs.


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1 comment:

  1. RRREEEeee! Thank you for sharing. I liked watching redwings in Maryland, where they travel in huge flocks. Never see them here at the far end of Virginia.

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