 These are a beautiful bird. The male is black and white with a triangular red patch on his breast. The female rose-breasted grosbeak is brown an streaked like a sparrow. They arrive in my area around spring time. During their courtship the males will fight. They will also sing and hover in the air around the female. It's an awesome sight if you can catch this display and see it for yourself. They come to my feeders for sunflower seeds and also are attracted to barberry, corn, beech trees, cherries, and redbud. I have heard that they have a great appetite for the Colorado potato beetle, but this I have not seen first hand. In my picture along with this post, there are two males sitting in my chestnut tree, this is right before they start to get the chestnuts on them, they love sitting in this tree, I'm not sure if they are finding some kind of insect on the flower part of the tree which is called the catkins, I know I've seen lots of different insects on these catkins and perhaps the grosbeak likes some of these. They breed from central Canada south through the Plains states, to the Northeast and also south to Georgia and Appalachia.. |
  
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