Adult Female. Plate LIII. Fig. 5.
Bill brown. Feet light blue. Upper parts in general light olive green; under parts dull orange, paler behind.
The Chickasaw Plum.
Prunus Chicasa, Mich. Flor. Amer. vol. i. p. 284. Pursh, Flor. Amer. vol. i. p. 332.—Icosandria Monogynia, Linn. Rosaceæ, Juss.
This species is distinguished by its oblongo-elliptical, acuminate, serrulate leaves; smooth spinescent branches; flowers in pairs, with very short pedicels, and glabrous calyces; and its broadly oval fruits. It flowers in April and May.
THE RICE BIRD.
Icterus agripennis, Ch. Bonap.
PLATE LIV. Male and Female.
Very few of these birds pass through Louisiana in spring, and still fewer, on their return, in autumn; for which reason I am inclined to think that they do not spend the winter months so much in the Southern parts of America as in some of the West India Islands. Indeed, I am the more inclined to believe this to be the case, that they seldom penetrate far into the interior, during their stay with us, but prefer the districts bordering upon the Atlantic, through which they pass and repass in incredible numbers.
In Louisiana, small detached flocks of males or of females appear about the middle of March and beginning of April, alighting in the meadows and grain-fields, where they pick up the grubs and insects found about the roots of the blades. I have heard it asserted, though I cannot give it as a fact, that the appearance of the Rice Bird in spring forebodes a bad harvest. The idea probably originates from the circumstance that these birds do not pass through Louisiana regularly every year, there being sometimes three or four springs in succession in which they are not observed.