Outdoor Ontario

Discussion => Behaviour => Topic started by: TomTelford on July 11, 2009, 05:41:40 PM

Title: Different Species flocking together?
Post by: TomTelford on July 11, 2009, 05:41:40 PM

I was puttering around in the back yard yesterday afternoon and I noticed a flock of about 50 birds fly by but there seemed to be two different species mixed together.  The more numerous seemed to be some type of blackbird, hard to tell but in the cowbird/RWBB size territory and quite dark/black.  The other birds were about half the size and more brownish, again like female cowbirds but much smaller.  I don't see any common black birds where the female is lighter AND significantly smaller in my book.  Juveniles maybe?

I know, hard to say without being sure of the species but it looked strange to me.

Tom.

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Post by: Bluffs Birder on July 11, 2009, 06:45:06 PM

Hi Tom,

I can't say for certain but a possibility could be that you saw Grackles as your "blackbirds" and the smaller birds were infact Red-wings or more likely Cowbirds, or even Starlings for that matter.  During the Spring and Fall migration period, we see hundreds of these mixed flocks flying overhead along the top of the Scarborough Bluffs.  You know the old saying "Birds of a Feather Flock Together".

Walter

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Post by: Kin Lau on July 12, 2009, 12:13:41 AM

I often see Starlings and Cowbirds together. At work, I occasionally see flocks of 10,000 or so in the fall.