Tricolored Blackbird
Latin: Agelaius tricolor
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The rare Tricolored Blackbird needs our help to survive.
This rare bird needs our help to survive. Photo: Photo by Martin Meyers
The Tricolored Blackbird is a remarkable bird that needs our help to survive. Found almost exclusively in California, its breeding colonies can sometimes grow to more than 20,000 birds, often all settled into a single 10-acre field or wetland to raise their young. While similar to the more widespread Red-winged Blackbird, male Tricolored Blackbirds are distinguished by their red shoulder patch with a bright white bar.
In the 19th Century, Tricolored Blackbird flocks were described as so numerous “as to darken the sky.” Since then, the population has declined from several million to fewer than 180,000 today. Over just the last 70 years, the Tricolored Blackbird population has decreased by more than 80%. As a result of recent population declines and ongoing threats, the species was listed as threatened under the California Endangered Species Act in April 2018.
The reasons for this decline are many, but the loss of wetland and nearby feeding habitats along the coast and in southern California and the Central Valley is the main issue. With the loss of native habitat, the species has become dependent on agricultural lands, with most of the largest colonies nesting in grain fields associated with dairies. A real dilemma develops because Tricolored young typically have not yet left the nest before the time farmers harvest their crop, and harvesting destroys Tricolored Blackbird nests and young.
Collaborative Conservation
Audubon California is working closely with landowners and its partners in the Tricolored Blackbird Working Group to protect this species across California. The Working Group is a collaborative alliance of farmers, agricultural associations, governmental agencies, and environmental organizations that have all recognized the importance of a multi-faceted and cooperative approach to promote the long-term persistence of the Tricolored Blackbird. The Working Group strives to reverse the population decline of this species and address threats to its survival.
The efforts of the Working Group are guided by the Tricolored Blackbird Conservation Plan that lays out a strategy to boost populations through long-term conservation planning and short-term action-oriented intervention. Specifically, the Plan commits stakeholders to implement: (1) habitat conservation projects to benefit the species; (2) a research program to more thoroughly understand the species’ life history; (3) a monitoring program to effectively document population trends and distribution; and (4) an outreach and education program to enhance public and private landowner awareness, and to build public support for conservation.
Audubon California has been leading the coordination of the working group’s efforts since 2011. For more information about these efforts or how you can help, please contact Tricolored Blackbird Conservation Project Manager Xerónimo Castañeda at xcastaneda@audubon.org.
Despite small breeding colonies in neighboring states, Tricolored Blackbirds are California's blackbird. Over 95 percent of the global population resides in the state. While anyone ever seeing a teeming flock of “trikes” feeding or in flight might have a hard time believing, the bird was listed as threatened under the California Endangered Species Act in 2019. However, Audubon research indicates that populations may be beginning to recover.
As recently as 1930, millions of Tricolored Blackbirds darkened the skies near Central Valley wetlands. As marshes were drained, the birds moved onto agricultural land, especially wheat fields. Farmers typically harvest their crop before nestlings have fledged, even wiping out the young of entire colonies in a single day as harvesting machinery moves across an occupied field. In surveys conducted from 2005 through 2009, less than half of colonies escaped destruction of their nesting areas.
For the past eight years, Audubon has worked together with farmers, the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Natural Resources Conservation Service and other partner organizations to locate colonies and encourage growers, through financial incentives, to postpone harvests until nestlings had fledged. In a study recently published in the journal Western Field Ornithologists, we found that this public-private partnership has been highly successful: from 2015 to 2022, nearly 100 percent of nesting attempts on agricultural land were conserved, and the number of birds nesting in grain fields increased by as much as 100,000. The reported increase in the population was confirmed during the most recent stateside survey in 2022. This survey is a coordinated voluntary effort, involving many chapter members across the state, to survey suitable habitat areas for birds resulting in a snapshot in time that tells us approximately how many birds are in the population. Protection of the most at-risk nesting sites is contributing to a bump in Tricolored Blackbird populations statewide, but innovative conservation efforts must be continued if the species is to recover fully.
We’ve done the math -- guaranteeing that a Tricolored Blackbird can fully fledge works out to about $1/bird. It’s a small price to pay to protect this beautiful species.
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