Brown Headed Cowbirds - A Brood Parasite

In this video you can learn tons of cool things about the Brown Headed Cowbird. From habitat to behavior, this video has everything. Did you know, that these birds don't raise their own young? Find out more in the video!

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[pklar]

When I first started birdwatching a little over a year ago, I was so confused whenever I saw the female cowbirds. They really look like huge finches. Thanks for the video. Very informative!

[Prismatic_Truth]

I love these birds. Their liquid musical call is so beautiful.

[Casualbystander]

Just got done working on a psych assignment that referenced these birdies. Turns out the males produce more potent songs when reared in isolation compared to growing up being able to interact with other birds. The more potent socially isolated songs actually are more enticing to females once the males are introduced into a group so much so, that the native residents try to kill the newcomers! Interesting to see how the male groups shape vocal behavior so much that it's actually LESS enticing to the women than the socially isolated males who are able to experiment with their own songs and sing at higher frequencies. Thanks for the video!

[cobythebirdnerd]

Have 4 males and 3 females here. Surprisingly they haven’t found the Robin nest to lay their eggs! Great video!

[InstrumentalArcanum]

These birds are awesome. They sound like R2D2.

[JoshuaSchultz]

A bird built a nest in our flower pot, i left it so the kids can watch it. Today we found a foreign egg and I came across your video here researching it. The video was great, you put a lot of effort into these, we watched a few and will keep watching!

[Yapity]

As cruel as it seems to destroy the nest if their egg is destroyed, it's easy to understand why it works from an evolutionary perspective. Raising a brood parasite alongside your own chicks definitely lowers your own chicks chance of survival, but it doesn't lower the chance as much as when the vengeful mom comes and destroys the whole batch of eggs.

This is also why lots of times if a brood parasite egg is discovered often the nest is completely abandoned in favour of starting over at a new nest site. If you manage to avoid getting any brood parasites at the new nest, it's worth the hassle.

[kayosborn]

Thanks for the great info on the cowbird.

[IreneDowningNature]

Wonderful information . Interesting birds they are. Thanks for sharing my friend. Enjoyed as usual Irene.💛⭐

[dotsdot]

for my science project, I'm gonna incubate cowbird eggs! 😊

[staticGeneratorYou]

Nice video! Subscribed. I’d like you to include bird song in your videos.

[Andrew_]

Cowbird, the name seems like the cow from sky 😂😂😂so cute

[experiencewonder]

Thanks for the video! Just had one visit!

[melodioushaste]

I'm so glad I watched this because today an obvious fledgling showed up and it seemed to be completely alone. I've been wondering about that all day.

[mstamgagirl]

They bully and run off smaller birds and will eat up all your seeds, plus rhey bring 50 more buddies with them.

[salmonidae]

I am not exactly sure why but I've noticed a great increase of brown headed cowbirds in my neighbourhood in recent years... perhaps it's due to range expansion?

[tychul]

I have one male that hangs around my backyard and always talks when I go outside to do my gardening and refilling the feeders. He has actually hopped down from my orange tree to be next to me when I was painting in the shade last week. Like literally just sat by my feet and just… chilled there. So strange. Didn’t touch him or anything because I thought it was so odd that maybe there was something wrong with him. He didn’t even get scared when I would shift my feet or in my chair. When I walked back inside to put stuff up, I went back out to check and see if he was still there but he was back up in the tree at that point. Still don’t know why he did that.

[LostBeetle]

Well as long as they are in their native habitat nature ought to be able to keep things in balance. I like them despite the bad reputation.

[tracyburris]

This is comment number 2 i found your content quite informative

[freeshrugs]

It is a very interesting topic. I've been watching short videos of cuckoo birds tossing the host eggs and baby birds out of the nest. Hard not to take sides!