Educate Yourself About the Orchard Oriole and Other Orioles
Orchard Oriole
The Orchard Oriole has a short bill, small and compact body, chestnut or russet colored body, rump, and underparts, wings that are more pointed than those of the Baltimore Oriole, and a short square tail. Its length is 6-7in (15-18cm) Its wingspan is 9in (24cm) Its voice is a fast-moving outburst with piping whistles, and guttural notes, a strident slurred “wheeer!”, that occurs at or close to the end. Their eggs are pale white-blue, blotched with gray, purple, and brown at the large end, with 1 clutch consisting of 4-5 or (3-7) eggs. The female incubates for about 12 days, and fledging time is around 11-14 days. Both male and female feed their young. The female is much paler, and more brownish, without the black hood.
The Orchard Oriole can be found east of the Great Plains, but is not as common as the Baltimore Oriole witch can be found there as well. You will find this bird’s habitat in open woods, in flowering trees, and mesquite, as well as in tree-lined streets in Prairie cities, to southern plantations in live oaks festooned with Spanish moss. Their narrow beaks have the perfect shape and length, to be able to probe deep into flowers for nectar.
Orioles are not especially shy of people, they will take up resident in your beautiful bird feeding garden, as long as it has a large shady tree in it. Orioles spend most of their time in treetops, so they are hard to see sometimes, unlike their relatives, the blackbirds, which spend most of their time on the ground. Try to listen for their loud voices, and maybe then you can pinpoint its location, and catch a glimpse of these beautiful brilliant orange or bright yellow feathered birds.
The Orchard Oriole diet consists of 90% insects, such as beetles, grasshoppers, weevils, caterpillars, mayflies, aphids, crickets, and cabbage butterflies. The rest of their diet consists of fruit and berries, like grapes, mulberries, strawberries, and raspberries. Most of them will winter from Mexico to northern South America, but unfortunately their specie has declined throughout their range, but for the northern prairie states.
The female will build a beautiful, thin-walled, woven structured nest, suspended from a tree branch, where they sway gently in the breeze. Usually it is constructed close to another Orchard Orioles nest, and sometimes near by an Eastern Kingbirds nest that will offer protection from dangerous predators. The nest consists of different kind of plant fibers, and is lined with thick, soft pads of plant down.
The Orchard Orioles are great parents as well, as they divide their brood in half; each talking responsibility for two or tree chicks, making sure they are well protected, and their hungry little tummies are filled with insect goodies.
If you like to attract the Orchard Oriole, and other orioles, plant shrubs that bear fruits, like blueberries, blackberries, serviceberries, and elderberries. Hang up oriole feeders, and fill them with sugar water, and cut oranges in half, for extra sweet treats. In the spring, provide 6in (15cm) lengths of strings and yarn from a hanging basket, in your lovely bird feeding garden.
Look up our section on RECEPIES andHUMMINGBIRDGARDENS to find out how to make your own sugar water solutions, and homemade oriole feeders at our website www.BIRDFEEDERSUSA.com
