Baltimore Orioles are inhabitants of the whole of North America, from
Canada to Mexico. They enter Louisiana as soon as spring commences
there. The name of Baltimore Oriole has been given it, because its
colors of black and orange are those of the family arms of Lord
Baltimore, to whom Maryland formerly belonged. Tradition has it that
George Calvert, the first Baron Baltimore, worn out and discouraged
by the various trials and rigours of temperature experienced in his
Newfoundland colony in 1628, visited the Virginia settlement. He
explored the waters of the Chesapeake, and found the woods and shores
teeming with birds, among them great flocks of Orioles, which so
cheered him by their beauty of song and splendor of plumage, that
he took them as good omens and adopted their colors for his own.
When the Orioles first arrive the males are in the majority; they sit
in the spruces calling by the hour, with lonely querulous notes. In a
few days however, the females appear, and then the martial music
begins, the birds' golden trumpeting often turning to a desperate
clashing of cymbals when two males engage in combat, for "the Oriole
has a temper to match his flaming plumage and fights with a will."
This Oriole is remarkably familiar, and fearless of man, hanging its
beautiful nest upon the garden trees, and even venturing into the
street wherever a green tree nourishes. The materials of which its
nest is made are flax, various kinds of vegetable fibers, wool, and
hair, matted together so as to resemble felt in consistency. A
number of long horse-hairs are passed completely through the fibers,
sewing it firmly together with large and irregular, but strong and
judiciously placed stitching. In one of these nests an observer found
that several of the hairs used for this purpose measured two feet in
length. The nest is in the form of a long purse, six or seven inches
in depth, three or four inches in diameter; at the bottom is arranged
a heap of soft material in which the eggs find a warm resting place.
The female seems to be the chief architect, receiving a constant
supply of materials from her mate, occasionally rejecting the fibers
or hairs which he may bring, and sending him off for another load more
to her taste.
Like human builders, the bird improves in nest building by practice,
the best specimens of architecture being the work of the oldest birds,
though some observers deny this.
The eggs are five in number, and their general color is whitish-pink,
dotted at the larger end with purplish spots, and covered at the
smaller end with a great number of fine intersecting lines of the same
hue.
In spring the Oriole's food seems to be almost entirely of an animal
nature, consisting of caterpillars, beetles, and other insects, which
it seldom pursues on the wing, but seeks with great activity among
the leaves and branches. It also eats ripe fruit. The males of this
elegant species of Oriole acquire the full beauty of their plumage the
first winter after birth.
The Baltimore Oriole is one of the most interesting features of
country landscape, his movements, as he runs among the branches of
trees, differing from those of almost all other birds. Watch him
clinging by the feet to reach an insect so far away as to require the
full extension of the neck, body, and legs without letting go his
hold. He glides, as it were, along a small twig, and at other times
moves sidewise for a few steps. His motions are elegant and stately.