Northern Mockingbird Eggs: Blue Green Shell With Brown Abstract Spots

Summary: Northern Mockingbirds (Mimus polyglottos) are the only New World mockingbird native to North America. Their beautiful eggs are blue green with brown marks.

Northern Mockingbird (Mimus polyglottos) perching in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, east central Florida: Ryan Hagerty/US Fish and Wildlife Service, Public Domain, via USFWS Digital Library

Mimus polyglottos (Ancient Greek: μῖμος, mimos, “mimic” + πολύς, polús, “many” + γλῶττα, glôtta, “tongue, language”) is the only New World mockingbird native to North America.

The intelligent, gifted mimic claims continental homelands from southeastern Canada southward and westward across the continental United States and further south throughout Mexico.

Known commonly as Northern Mockingbird, the North American avian native also claims island homelands in the Bahamas, the Cayman Islands, and the Greater Antilles (Cuba, Dominican Republic, Haiti, Jamaica, Puerto Rico).

Northern Mockingbirds are honored officially among governmental symbols as the state bird of five southern states: Arkansas, Florida, Mississippi, Tennessee and Texas.

Originally the Northern Mockingbird was designated as the official state bird of South Carolina in 1939. In 1948, the Carolina wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) replaced the mockingbird as Carolina’s state bird.

Females and males are not distinguished by sexual dimorphism (Ancient Greek: δίς, dís, “twice” + μορφή, morphḗ, “form, shape” +  -ισμός, -ismós, suffix forming abstract nouns). Basically, they are look alikes.

As a medium-sized songbird, the Northern Mockingbird presents a long silhouette. The New World native has a downward curving, long, thin bill; long legs; long tail feathers.

Overall coloration emphasizes gray and white. Each wing sports a white patch, often discernible in folded wings of perching Northern Mockingbirds and vividly visible as large white flashes in flight. Outer tail feathers also showily flash their whiteness in flight.

Parenting two to three broods annually, the Northern Mockingbird lays strikingly beautiful eggs that vary greatly in color and markings. The oval-shaped eggs, numbering two to six per brood, or clutch, appear as pale blue, bluish green, greenish blue or greenish white shells. Shells bear natural, decorative splotches in shades of brown, especially cinnamon (yellowish brown), hazel (golden-brown), rufous (rust-brown), russet (reddish-orange brown) or tawny (light brownish orange).

Last week, during April's transition into May, as I was doing yard work in the west lawn that slopes to an ephemeral creek, I glimpsed the broken half of a blue-green shell, riddled with rusty brown abstract blotches and cradled by blades of grass.

The pastel half-shell was lying against one of the surface roots extending from the south face of the capacious boxelder maple (Acer negundo) that shades the central section of the west lawn. After a few moments of scouting, I espied the shell's other half propped against a nearby surface root. Hopefully a hatchling split open the egg rather than an unpleasant alternative, such as dire evidence of a predatory nest-robber.

Over the weekend, on Sunday, May 2, a quiet adult Northern Mockingbird occasionally perched conspicuously overhead, on less leafy branches, as I mowed and weeded the lushly carpeted creek banks. The silent songbird may have been guarding hatchlings.

I like to think that my avian observer was pleased with my lawn sculpting endeavors. Favoring short grass, Northern Mockingbirds appreciate mowed lawns.

Northern Mockingbird eggs: image by ZooFari, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Acknowledgment

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Image credits:

Northern Mockingbird perching in Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, Brevard County, east central Florida: Ryan Hagerty/US Fish and Wildlife Service, Public Domain, via USFWS Digital Library @ http://digitalmedia.fws.gov/cdm/singleitem/collection/natdiglib/id/15074/rec/5

Northern Mockingbird eggs in nest in Las Vegas, Nevada: ZooFari, Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Mocking_Bird_eggs.JPG

For further information:

“Northern Mockingbird: Life History.” The Cornell Lab of Ornithology All About Birds > Guide.
Available @ http://www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Northern_Mockingbird/lifehistory

“South Carolina State Bird.” Netstate > States > Symbols > Birds. Last updated April 19, 2015.
Available @ http://www.netstate.com/states/symb/birds/sc_carolina_wren.htm