Eastern Meadowlark Songs and Calls

Variety of sounds of Eastern Meadowlarks singing and calling. Eastern Meadowlarks dominate the soundscape of Florida grasslands, ranch lands and grassy marshlands and especially in the few large areas of remaining prairie in Florida.
These stunning birds sing their beautiful flutelike songs from perches with good vantage points such as isolated scrub trees and bushes in grassland and fence posts on range and farm land.

They do sing all winter in Florida where they are permanent residents, but really increase their singing activity in the spring breeding season. They are not too likely to visit backyard feeders unless you are fortunate enough to live near some wide open spaces like a farm or ranch house or perhaps on a very large suburban lot on the order of 5 acres or so.

An Eastern Meadowlark male can sing many different variations of its famous flutelike song. You'll hear a number of variations in the following clips. They also have a variety of calls that you'll hear such as chattering or short buzzes for contact or when they are alarmed or perhaps irritated by photographers in their remote habitat.

A member of the Blackbird family their bright-yellow underparts and striking black chevron across their chests really sticks out when perching. But they spend most of the time on the ground in the grass probing for insects with their long, sharp bills. On the ground, their rather common looking brown-and-black striped upperparts serve well to camouflage the birds among the grass. You can spot their white outer tail feathers easier when they are on the ground.

I find their long claws fascinating – probably good for grasping onto to spindly perches and scratching about among the grass for bugs. Interestingly, there is a very similar, but unrelated bird of the east African grasslands that is called the Yellow-throated Longclaw

Most of the meadowlarks I meet live in the vast open windy prairie and attempts to isolated the meadowlarks songs and calls and filter out wind noise - even when using wind screens are not always successful so forgive the occasional strange sound in the background.
Meadowlark populations are declining due to habitat loss.

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