• Journal of Ecology and Environment
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.41-45
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• 2009

For last 150 years, blackbirds have moved from their ancestral habitat, the woodland edge, to man-made habitats such as farmland, parks and gardens. These alternative habitats have become one of main blackbird habitats. I compared density of nests and blackbirds in parks, woodland and campus of University of East Anglia to investigate habitat preference. Blackbirds preferred the area covered by $10\sim50%$ of tree or bush patches for their foraging and nesting sites. Blackbirds were more frequently found near buildings rather than far from buildings. Nest characteristics did not affect predation rate and nest preference. This study suggests that man-made habitats may be important for avoiding predation.

• Animal cells and systems
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• v.3 no.1
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• pp.41-46
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• 1999

An experiment was conducted among free-ranging red-winned blackbirds (Agelaius phoeniceus) that acquired illness-induced conditioned taste aversion (CTA) by consuming insect prey tainted with a dose of parathion up to 2.0 mg/kg consumer body weight. Birds quickly acquired CTA and avoided all four insect prey during a lengthy posttest without parathion. This experiment proved that organophosphate insecticide application in the field might decrease the food consumption of wild birds and may also affect the reproductive success of breeding birds. Thus, CTA acquired accidentally after eating insecticide contaminated insect prey appears to be one of the reasons for the decreasing number of breeding songbirds in North America.