Brown-headed Cowbirds

by Barry Kent MacKay

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Price

$250

Dimensions

8.000 x 10.000 x 0.250 inches

Title

Brown-headed Cowbirds

Artist

Barry Kent MacKay

Medium

Painting - Acrylic On Compressed Hardboard

Description

I am somewhat isolated in my affection for the Brown-headed Cowbird (Molothrus ater), a very common species found throughout nearly all of temperate and subtropical North America, south deep into Mexico. Northern birds are migratory. They are members of the blackbird family, Icteridae, which is confined to the western hemisphere, and includes what are called orioles, meadowlarks, grackles, Bobolinks, caciques, and troupials. Dislike of cowbirds derives from the fact that they lay their eggs in the nests of any of a wide range of other species, usually smaller birds, and those eggs hatch to produce sturdy nestlings who evict the nest-builder’s own eggs or babies. Thus, for virtually every cowbird you see, a clutch of baby birds of another species perished. The cowbirds do not simply forget their own eggs, but seem to keep watch on them, and will even ravage the nest if the host does not brood the egg, as if taking revenge. The cowbirds are not purposeful (unlike humans choosing to consume the eggs, not to mention the muscles and other body parts, of chickens) but are what are called “obligate brood parasites”; they have no choice. I tend to see the results a little differently than do the cowbird critics. Since it is not possible for the gravid female cowbird to find every nest of a host species, the numbers of cowbirds signify healthy numbers of their hosts. Most of the hosts are smaller species, and in my suburban neighbourhood the most common surrogate cowbird parent is the Chipping Sparrow. It is not unusual to see a baby cowbird larger than the Chipping Sparrow, or other species, feeding it. The stress of satisfying a single baby cowbird appear to be equal to, if not greater than, those associated with feeding an entire brood of the host’s own young, but we still do have lots of Chipping Sparrows. Some species have evolved strategies to cope with the cowbird eggs. American Robins and Gray Catbirds usually just pitch them from the nest. Yellow Warblers are famous for building another floor to the nest over top of the cowbird (and their own) eggs, and some such nests are several tiers high. Gnatcatchers abandon the nest, including their own, as well as the invasive eggs. The unwitting host feeds the intrusive cowbird what its own young what cowbird babies require, and the latter may sicken and die for lack of the species-appropriate diet, mostly insects. The painting, approximately life-size, is in acrylics on compressed hardboard and is 10” by 8”. $250.00

Uploaded

April 1st, 2021

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