 At our May meeting, member Paulette Heward shared an interesting story about a cowbird that laid an egg in her bluebird house, offering a firsthand look at this bird’s unusual behavior. Cowbirds earned their name from their habit of following herds of buffalo and cattle, feeding on the insects stirred up by the moving animals. Because their food source is always on the move, cowbirds don’t have time to build nests of their own. Instead, they lay their eggs in the nests of other songbirds—a behavior known as brood parasitism. In the spring, a female cowbird will perch in a tree and watch for other birds carrying nesting materials. Once she spots a potential host, she quietly sneaks in and lays a single egg, usually after the host bird has already laid its first egg. Her job done, she moves on to find another nest, potentially laying up to forty eggs in different nests over a single season. While cowbirds are often seen as parasitic, their fascinating reproductive strategy is a unique adaptation to their nomadic lifestyle.
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