American Robin - BirdForum Opus

Male
Photo by mmdnje
Atlanta, Georgia, USA

Turdus migratorius

Identification

25–28 cm (10–11 in) long. It weighs about 77 g (2.7 oz)

• Gray upperparts and head
• Brick-red breast in male, orange in female, with white belly and undertail coverts
• White eye-ring, interrupted at front and back.
  

Breeding male: distinctive black head feathers

Female
Photo by GarryKirsch
Quinte West, Ontario, April 2009

Distribution

Bird of North America. Breeds over most of North America, in the east as far as Labrador and Newfoundland.

Northern birds are migratory leaving breeding areas in August-September and eastern birds winter from Newfoundland southwards, returning late March-mid May.

In the Western Palearctic recorded in Iceland (four records) and the British Isles, France and Belgium, Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Czechoslovakia and Austria, also recently in Spain.

Most frequently seen in Britain and Ireland (>30) mostly September-February with occasional records April-June. The records are scattered from Shetland to Scilly but there is a distinct bias towards the Northen Isles and the south-west.

Taxonomy

Subspecies^[1]

Juvenile
Photo by KCFoggin
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, USA

• T. m. nigrideus:

• Eastern Canada (northern Quebec and Labrador) to Gulf Coast of US

• T. m. migratorius:

• Northern Alaska and northern Canada to central US; winters eastern Mexico and Cuba

• T. m. achrusterus:

• South-central US; winters to south-eastern Mexico

• T. m. caurinus:

• South-eastern Alaska and western Canada to north-western Oregon; winters to California

• T. m. propinquus:

• Eastern British Columbia to south-western US and south-western Mexico; winters to Guatemala

• T. m. phillipsi:

• Eastern Mexico (south-western Tamaulipas to Puebla, Guerrero and Oaxaca)

• T. m. confinis: Pale gray-brown underparts.

• Mountains of southern Baja California (Sierra de la Laguna)

Habitat

Open woodland and clearings in forest, farmland with copses and hedgerows, often in lowlands and frequently near water. In many areas has become an urban bird breeding in town parks and gardens.

Behaviour

Diet: Consists of about 40 percent invertebrates, such as beetle grubs, caterpillars and grasshoppers, and 60 percent wild and cultivated fruits and berries. Frequently seen running across lawns, running and stopping with an stiff erect posture, then stopping to pick up prey, which it locates by sight, not hearing.
Breeding: The female builds the nest and lays three or four blue eggs in the lined cup. The female does most of the incubation and it takes around a month for the chicks to fledge. There is often a second brood, the male caring for the fledglings whilst the female incubates the new clutch. Bird banders found that only 25% of young robins survive the first year.

References

1. Clements, JF. 2008. The Clements Checklist of Birds of the World. 6th ed., with updates to December 2008. Ithaca: Cornell Univ. Press. ISBN 978-0801445019.

1. Robins Nestcam
2. Shepherd Software
3. Surfbirds
4. Absolute Astronomy
5. Wikipedia

External Links

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