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Indigo Bunting – Bird of the Ecotone
Look for them at Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge
© Joanne Kamo
Many birds – like this Indigo Bunting – can be found in ecotones, the borders between two habitats. Indigo Buntings breed in the ecotone between forest and meadow. They are common at Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge in Indiana, where grassland and forest are interspersed to produce superb wildlife habitat.
BirdNote®
Indigo Bunting - Bird of the Ecotone
Written by Dennis Paulson
This is BirdNote!
[Early summer bird ambience – Mississippi Flyway - with Indigo Bunting]
Many of our birds can be found in ecotones, the borders between two habitats. Like Indigo Buntings, which breed in the ecotone between forest and meadow. They use resources available in either habitat.
[Indigo Bunting song]
Indigo Buntings are common at Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge in Indiana. [mus-CAT-a-tuck]. There, grassland and forest are interspersed to produce superb wildlife habitat. The buntings feed on the ground and nest in shrubs or weedy fields. The males find perfect places for singing from elevated perches at the forest edge.
[Indigo Bunting song]
Female buntings know what they like, and arriving from Mexico and Central America, they search for just such an ecotone.
[Indigo Bunting song]
With the right balance of forest and meadow, this beautiful bird will continue to thrive.
[Early summer bird ambience – Mississippi Flyway – including Indigo Bunting]
For BirdNote, I’m Mary McCann.
BirdNote celebrates the everyday actions of our listeners and the work of our conservation partners to reverse the alarming decline in North American birds. Together, we can bring them back. Learn more and get involved at birdnote.org.
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Soundscape of early summer bird ambience recorded by Gordon Hempton of QuietPlanet.com
Bird sounds provided by The Macaulay Library of Natural Sounds at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Song of Indigo Bunting [73948] recorded by G.A. Keller.
BirdNote’s theme music was composed and played by Nancy Rumbel and John Kessler.
Producer: John Kessler
Executive Producer: Chris Peterson
© 2013 Tune In to Nature.org July 2013/2020 / June 2022 Narrator: Mary McCann
ID# INBU-01-2013-07-30 INBU-01b
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