[Illustration: Fig. 12.--Baltimore oriole. Length, about 7½ Inches.]
Brilliancy of plumage, sweetness of song, and food habits to which no
exception can be taken are some of the striking characteristics of the
Baltimore oriole[37] (fig. 12). In summer it is found throughout the
northern half of the United States east of the Great Plains. Its nest
commands hardly less admiration than the beauty of its plumage or the
excellence of its song. Hanging from the tip of the outermost bough of
a stately elm, it is almost inaccessible to depredators and so strongly
fastened as to bid defiance to the elements.
[37] _Icterus galbula_.
Observation both in the field and laboratory shows that caterpillars
constitute the largest item of the fare of the oriole. In 204 stomachs
they formed 34 per cent of the food, and they are eaten in varying
quantities during all the months in which the bird remains in this
country. The fewest are eaten in July, when a little fruit also is taken.
The other insects consist of beetles, bugs, ants, wasps, grasshoppers,
and some spiders. The beetles are principally click beetles, the larvæ of
which are among the most destructive insects known; and the bugs include
plant and bark lice, both very harmful, but so small and obscure as to
be passed over unnoticed by most birds. Ants are eaten mostly in spring,
grasshoppers in July and August, and wasps and spiders with considerable
regularity throughout the season.
During the stay of the oriole in the United States, vegetable matter
amounts to only a little more than 16 per cent of its food, so that the
possibility of its doing much damage to crops is very limited. The bird
is accused of eating peas to a considerable extent, but remains of such
were found in only two cases. One writer says that it damages grapes, but
none were found in the stomachs.