There Are a Lot of Grackles in the Valley. Where Do They Come From?
Excerpt from Valley 101: A Slightly Skewed Guide to Living in Arizona, a collection of Clay Thompson’s columns for The Arizona Republic. (Originally published November 8, 2001.)
Q: I was born and raised in Phoenix. I grew up with cactus wrens, roadrunners and quail, but where did all these grackles come from? A friend of mine says they were always here, but I think they are a recent occurrence. Can you elucidate?
Female Great-tailed Grackle. Photo by Michael “Mike” L. Baird, bairdphotos.com.
A: I can now say that I looked up “elucidate.”
This is one of several grackle questions I have received lately, and I take it up with some trepidation. A year or so ago I wrote some less than complimentary things about grackles and received a number of calls and letters from people who actually like grackles. I can’t imagine why, but there you have it.
This is the time of year for grackle questions because this is the time of year when grackles congregate, especially in the evening, in big flocks to poop on things and exchange the news of the day at the top of their lungs.
Anyway, in answer to your question, great-tailed grackles have been moving north from Mexico for years. The first record of them in Maricopa County was three birds spotted near Peoria in 1954. By 1970 they were considered common.
Common grackles, which are even less desirable than great-tailed grackles, are another story. They have been moving west since European colonists began turning forest land into farmland. They are still mostly found east of the Rockies, but there have been sightings in Maricopa County.
The only good thing I can say about the great-tailed grackles is that they DO eat crickets.
And crickets are the favored food (or so I’m told) of scorpions. It’s one of those lemons-making-lemonade-making-bad-tasting-water-taste-good thingies. 😉
We moved here to Arizona last year from California. I don’t ever recall seeing a grackle in California so living here has been my 1st experience with them. All I can say about them from what i have seen so far is that they seem to all be possessed.
I call them Walmart birds! They keep the trash cleaned up that people leave behind.
While I grudgingly admire how well-equipped they are to THRIVE, I don’t like them. I believe they negatively affect other bird populations, and their population is out of control. I was told by someone who should know, that they raid the nests of other birds and eat the babies’ brains.
Regarding growing up here — I was born in ’49, and they were not around while I was growing up. What WAS around that you don’t see here anymore were red=winged blackbirds.
I had some flycatchers that nest in my porch every year. The Grackles eat the babies when they are fledglings. It’s very sad. It happens every year.
There used to be a lot of those little brown sparrows. I hardly see those anymore.
I grew up in Phoenix and I know for a fact these grackles weren’t here when I was young and for many years into my adulthood. When I first started seeing them, I believe, was around the late nineties. They may have been incubating in some more remote parts of Arizona prior to that but I know I never saw them sitting on wires or fences as a child or hopping around on the ground even in the early nineties when my daughter was young. Now there are so many I think they’re outnumbering the sparrows in population. I looked the birds up back in the early 2000’s after I was told at first by someone that they were European Starlings, a slightly more colorful bird with shorter legs and light colored beak.. Grackles have lots of character and will use many of the same gimmicks people use to get food when they see people eating.
Contrary to most of the negative comments posted by people who know very little of these intelligent birds…I happen to love them. They are very clever, resourceful, adaptive and play an important role in the environment eating small insects and yes not unlike other birds, they will prey on the eggs of other birds and sometimes their young…get over it…there may be things we find repulsive in different birds and animals but the end result is, this is the role they play in the scheme of things in the natural world…besides, we have thousands of humans that kill their own offspring and other people; so no living thing on this planet is without its flaws.
WELL SAID!
I have a gorgeous long tailed grackle in my backyard and I love seeing him everyday. I can’t say that I’ve witnessed one negative thing about him. He appears to get along very well with all my other birds and I have everything from Gila Woodpeckers to Hummingbirds, House Finches, White winged doves, and mourning doves.
I see that I have mostly young birds right now and I do not see the grackle being a threat to them.
The Grackles have taken over our yard. Chasing and attacking other birds. ( even our mockingbird!!) It started with one 6 years ago. Now you only rarely see others. Especially finchs/sparrows. I miss the other birds.
I grew up in The Arcadia area of Phoenix in the 60’s and 70’s. The only place I remember seeing grackles was at the zoo. We had loads of sparrows where I grew up. Also huge flocks of red winged black birds. I also remember quite a few cardinals and robins. Later (in the 1980’s I remember seeing flocks of black phainopeplas with white on their wings out in the desert north of Scottsdale. Now all I see are grackles, starlings, doves and love birds.