Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Great-tailed Grackle


Behavior

This bird has a large variety of raucous, cacophonous calls, and is widely considered to be a noisy pest species, though its range expansion has not been aided by human introduction (compared to the European Starling). The females can travel in flocks and they share food. When a male spots a female, he engages her by puffing up and gaping his mouth. He then proceeds to make loud calls and follow the female. The female will allow the large males to mate with her; she will usually reject smaller males.