The males are black birds (legth 16 cm) with a splendidly red
breast. The females and young have more brown and much less red
on their breast. The males can be seen and heard singing on large
wet fields with long grass or on cemetaries, ricefields and on
the grasssavannas.
(On the second picture you see a male, that just stopped
singing, in the fields near the Anton de Kom university buildings
in Paramaribo, the first one shows a singing male.)
As with many birds in this family (for instance the caciques and
oropendolas) the males can have more then one female. He will
sing in his territory and chase away other males. Sometimes the
male will fly up singing and fall back to the ground. The females
take care of the breeding in nests, that can be found on the
ground. The blackbirds (outside the breeding season) fly around
in larger numbers (dozens) when they assembleto go to sleep
together.
First photo made by Dennis Binda in August 2008, then one by J.H. Ribot, the third one is by Ronald Teulings (all in Suriname) and around this text two made by Pascal Dubois in French Guyane. Then one made by K. Dijkstra and one by D. Plouvier, both in Suriname.
Each small square indicates the observation of at least one (group) of these birds, the medium ones at least 4 observations on different days and the largest ones 10 or more. The color of each square indicates: blue for coastal area, yellow for savanna and red for rainforest. Sometimes dozens are seen together.
| Distribution in Suriname (explanation) | |
| Coastal area |  |
| Savanna |  |
| Forests |  |
| Mountain forests | |
| Sipalawini savanna | |
Names in
More pictures of Blackbirds in Suriname
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