Just the other day I stood in the parking lot staring up at a tree dotted with at least fifty Red-winged blackbirds - what a sound! The best way to describe the sound was a constant conk-la-reeeeeeeee!

It was the sound of spring as they sang for a lot longer than I could stand there gaping at them.

Red-winged blackbirds males are a glossy black with red patches on their shoulders, which are visible when resting. A small patch of yellow feathers can be seen below the red patches. These shoulder patches are called epaulets.

Females resemble large sparrows, with various shades of brown streaked with creamy white throughout the bodies. I didn’t know that until one day I called my boss, Susan Gallagher, to tell her I had seen the biggest sparrow at the bird feeder outside my office window. She explained that that sparrow was a female Red-winged blackbird without even seeing the bird. That figures.

The males are always showing off beautiful colors to impress the females.

There are an estimated two hundred million Red-winged blackbirds that range from Southeast Alaska and Canada across the lower forty-eight states and into Central America. While they are migratory, they can overwinter as far north as British Columbia and Pennsylvania.

The Red-winged blackbirds are among the earliest spring migrants. Red-winged Blackbirds can form huge roosts during the winter. Up to a million birds will stay in one area at night.

During the daytime, they will disperse up to fifty miles away in search of food. With population numbers like that it’s no wonder they have several collective nouns, including a “cloud,” “cluster,” and “merl” of blackbirds.

Both male and female Red-winged blackbirds have more than one partner.

The males will do everything they can to be noticed. They will perch on a high stalk with their feathers fluffed to defend their territories and attract the females while flashing their bright red shoulder patches. They can defend up to 10 females in their territories and will attack much larger birds, such as crows and ravens.

Red-winged blackbirds raise two to three broods per season. Build new nests each time keeps the nests from becoming infected with parasites that could kill the baby birds. Three to five pale blue green eggs marked with dark brown, and purple are laid in well-made cups of marsh grass or reeds and attached to the same type of vegetation. Incubation is approximately 13 days and is conducted by the females.

Red-winged blackbirds breed from Alaska east across Canada and south to northern Baja California, central Mexico, the Gulf Coast, and Florida.

Migrating during the winters regularly across the U.S. north to British Columbia, Great Lakes, and Pennsylvania.

Their preferred habitats include fresh and saltwater marshes, meadows, fields, and other croplands.

Their favorite habitats are the cattail marshes and other wetlands where they eat the seeds and insects.

Studies on food availability have shown that in a marsh that is surrounded by woods, females deliver a greater amount of food per hour to their nestlings than females who nest at a marsh surrounded by agricultural land.

Also, the males care is less important to the nestlings in the woodland marsh than in the agricultural marsh. The study also found that males at the woodland marsh had over twice as many mates than the males at the agricultural marsh.

These birds feed on insects, small fruits, seeds, waste grain, and small aquatic invertebrates as they run or hop over the ground.

Although regarded as pests because they eat grain in cultivated fields, the farmer also benefits from consumption of harmful insects.

Ahhh, just listen to that music of signaling that spring is not far off - conk-la-reeeeeeeee!

Jeannie Carl is a naturalist at the Carbon County Environmental Education Center in Summit Hill. The center rehabilitates injured animals and educates the public on a variety of wildlife found in the area. For information, visit www.carboneec.org.