From Opus

Male
Photo by wv_vireo
Stauffer's Marsh, Shanghai, West Virginia, USA

Icterus galbula

[edit] Identification

L. 18-22cm (7-8.5")
Male

• Black head, back, wings, and tail
• Orange breast, rump, and shoulder patch

There is no other eastern bird which resembles the male Baltimore Oriole.

Female
Photo by red-dawn35
East Rock Park, Connecticut, USA

Female

• Olive-brown above
• Dull yellow-orange underparts
• 2 dull white wing bars

[edit] Distribution

Breeds from Saskatchewan and Nova Scotia south through the Dakotas south to eastern Texas, Louisiana, and Virginia. Winters in Florida, along southern Atlantic coast of the United States, Central America, and northern South America. Rare vagrant to California.

Immature
Photo by stephennj
New Jersey, USA, August 2008

Casual vagrant elsewhere in the western United States.
Accidental vagrant to Greenland, Iceland, Ireland, the UK, Norway, the Netherlands, and Chile.

[edit] Taxonomy

The Baltimore Oriole was once combined with the western counterpart Bullock's Oriole as a single species, the Northern Oriole, because they began to interbreed on the Great Plains, when the two forms extended their ranges and met.

This is in spite of these two forms not being each others closest relatives (the closest relative of Baltimore Oriole is the Black-backed Oriole.

[edit] Subspecies

This is a monotypic species^[1].

[edit] Habitat

Deciduous woodlands and shade trees. Before the tree's decline, the American elm was a favorite nesting site for the eastern bird.

[edit] Behaviour

Very acrobatic in the tree canopy.

Photo by Heiku-me
New York State, US, June 2011

[edit] Diet

Their diet consists mainly of insects and fruit.

[edit] Breeding

Four to six greyish eggs, spotted and scrawled with dark brown and black. Nest is a well-woven pendant bag of plant fibres, bark, and string, suspended from the tip of a branch.

[edit] Vocalisation

Song: Clear and flute-like whistled single or double notes in short, distinct phrases with much individual variation.
Call: A harsh check call given during alarm by both male and female.

[edit] In Culture

The Baltimore Oriole is the State Bird of Maryland

[edit] References

1. Clements, JF. 2011. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to August 2011. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019. Spreadsheet available at http://www.birds.cornell.edu/clementschecklist/downloadable-clements-checklist
2. Birds of America
3. Birdforum thread discussing the Taxonomy of New World Orioles
4. Birdforum thread discussing the hybridization in "Northern Orioles"

• List of references

[edit] External Links