Blackbird with Sound 13cm - Soft Toy

Physical Characteristics
The Common Blackbird is 23 to 29cm in length and has a long tail. The adult male has glossy black plumage, blackish-brown legs, a yellow eye-ring and an orange-yellow bill. The adult female is sooty-brown with a dull yellowish-brownish bill, a brownish-white throat and some weak mottling on the breast. The young is similar to the female, but has pale spots on the upperparts and the very young juvenile also has a speckled breast.

Habitat
The Common Blackbird breeds in temperate Eurasia, North Africa, the Canary Islands and South Asia. It has been introduced to Australia and New Zealand. Common over most of its range in woodland, the Common Blackbird has a preference for deciduous trees with dense undergrowth. However, gardens provide the best breeding habitat with up to three pairs per acre.

Behaviour
The male Common Blackbird defends its breeding territory, chasing away other males or utilising a "bow and run" threat display. This consists of a short run, the head first being raised and then bowed with the tail dipped simultaneously. If a fight between male Blackbirds does occur, it is usually short and the intruder is soon chased away. The female Blackbird is also aggressive in the spring when it competes with other females for a good nesting territory and although fights are less frequent, they tend to be more violent.

Breeding
The male Common Blackbird attracts the female with a courtship display which consists of oblique runs combined with head-bowing movements, an open beak, and a strangled-sounding low song. Species is monogamous and the established pair will usually stay together as long as they both survive. The female incubates for 12-14 days before the chicks are hatched naked and blind. Fledging takes another 13 days on average, with both parents feeding the young. The young are fed by the parents for up to three weeks after leaving the nest and will follow the adults begging for food. If the female starts another nest, the male alone will feed the fledged young.

Diet
The Common Blackbird eats a wide range of insects, earthworms, seeds and berries. It feeds mainly on the ground, running and hopping with a start-stop-start progress. It pulls earthworms from the soil, usually finding them by sight but sometimes by hearing, and roots through leaf litter for other invertebrates. Small vertebrates such as frogs, tadpoles and lizards are occasionally hunted.

Strange and Interesting Facts
The blackbird was seen as a sacred, though destructive, bird in Classical Greek folklore. Like many other small birds, in the past blackbirds have been hunted for food, and the medieval tradition of placing live birds under a pie crust just before serving is thought to be the origin of the familiar nursery rhyme Sing a Song of Sixpence.