Brown-headed Cowbird fledgling

[Lisa Millbank]

A White-crowned Sparrow pair is feeding their fledgling Brown-headed Cowbird at the community garden in Starker Park.  I first thought I saw a cowbird on Wednesday, but I didn't have binoculars or my camera with me.  Tonight we watched a sparrow fly up and stuff a bug in his big baby's hungry mouth.  Raising a baby cowbird impacts the White-crowns' reproductive success, but I still thought the interactions between the "stepparents" and their baby were very sweet, like any birds feeding their young.

  

I don't think of cowbirds as particularly common around here, which is probably just as well, but their lifestyle is a very interesting one.  I find it interesting that if that little cowbird is a male, he will grow up to recognize and court a female cowbird, not a White-crowned Sparrow.  If female, she will appreciate the male's "gleep" song and display, although it's unlikely that she's ever heard it before.  I always thought that a lot of birds experience sexual imprinting on the wrong species if they have foster parents, but I guess that's clearly not the case for cowbirds! 

 

Lisa

www.neighborhood-naturalist.com

 

[b_g...@comcast.net]

Coincidentally, I just happen to hear a radio story on nest-parasite bird imprinting.  Here's a link to the audio file. Just scroll down to the part titled "Confused Parasitic Ducks" if you don't want to listen to the whole show.
http://www.cbc.ca/quirks/archives/09-10/qq-2010-06-26.html

Cheers,
Bill

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[Lisa Millbank]

That was pretty interesting about the parasitic ducks.  I guess it's not easy to be a brood parasite.  Species like the cowbird that are exclusively parasitic are really quite rare.

I found an article about how male cowbirds have to have some social conditioning to learn to sing and court female cowbirds.  It was titled, "From 'duds' to 'studs'---even cowbirds need mentors to learn lessons of love." http://www.iu.edu/~ocmhp/042602/text/cowbirdlove.html

 

Lisa

www.neighborhood-naturalist.com

 

 

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