There are reportedly 10 million Great-tailed Grackles, ranging from northwestern Venezuela and Colombia, through Mexico and the U.S. and into southern Canada. In winter, many of the northern ones come south, swelling the Valley’s flocks to gargantuan proportions to upwards of half a million birds. They frequent sugarcane and corn fields and land freshly plowed.
A species that is thoroughly urbanized, they have embraced our culinary delights such as tacos, French-fries, biscuits, and other offerings abandoned on parking lot pavements.
A medium-sized bird, the males appear overall glossy black until the sun glints their iridescent hues of brilliant copper, amethyst, green, and purple. The females are about half the size of the males, and are buff-cinnamon and brown in color with a faint iridescent purple patch at each shoulder. Both males and females have yellow eyes.
Great-tailed Grackles are omnivorous and opportunistic, noted for their diverse foraging habits: in addition to fast food scraps, they eat crustaceans, insects, spiders, bees, slugs, moths, worms, and small reptiles and mammals to fruit, berries, and grains. They hunt tadpoles and catch fish by wading or by flying close to the water’s surface.