Birding Better Know a Bird: The Massive, Fickle Breeding Colonies of Tricolored Blackbirds. The Tricolored Blackbird was classified as endangered in 2006 by BirdLife International. The tricolored blackbird is a passerine bird of the family Icteridae. Their nests are rarely built on the ground (Neff 1937).
This is problematic because some crops are harvested during the middle of the breeding season when there are eggs and/or young in the nests.
Tricolored Blackbird activity at colonies in 1994 and 1997. 1987) (Tricolored Blackbird Portal 2015). Silage is primarily grains that are used to feed animals. Tricolored blackbirds construct nests of mud and plant material and usually build them in a few feet above or near fresh water (Granholm 1990). 2016. Breeding Status of the Tricolored Blackbird in the Grassland-Dominated Region of the Sierra Nevada, California in 2016 Peer-Reviewed Paper Daniel A. Airola, Northwest Hydraulic onsultants, 2600 apital Ave, Suite 140, Sacramento, A. Overall outline of the range is stable, though numbers of breeders have declined dramatically. The tricolored blackbird (Agelaius tricolor) is a passerine bird of the family Icteridae.Its range is limited to the coastal areas of the Pacific coast of North America, from Northern California in the U.S. (with occasional strays into Oregon), to upper Baja California in Mexico. Nest survival of Tricolored Blackbirds in California's Central Valley. This network produced an increasing- ly complete seasonal record of distribution, abundance, and schedule during successive years. Tricolored blackbird nests are bound to upright plant stems from a few centimeters to about 1.8 meters (6 feet) above water or ground (Baicich and Harrison 1997); however, nests in the canopies of willows and ashes may be more than 3.7 meters (12 feet) high (Hamilton pers.
Tricolored Blackbird colonies in (A) a dairy silage field and (B) a wetland duck-club pond in Kern County, California, USA. At first glance, the species might be hard to distinguish from Red-winged Blackbirds, but wait until they gather by the tens of thousands to nest. The majority of the Tricolored Blackbird population (~79% in 2011) uses agricultural fields as nesting habitat. Tricolored Blackbirds historically nested in wetlands, but a large proportion of the population now nests in agricultural grain fields where the crop is ready to harvest before the young have fledged. The Tricolored Blackbird is California's blackbird—more than 99% of the global population occurs within the state.
The common name is … Historically, most colonies were established in freshwater marshes dominated by cattails and bulrushes, with willows, mugwort, and nettles.