Habitat:
Range is from Alaska and Canada to southern Mexico. Winters only south of Canada. Northerners see their "first robin of spring" when flocks migrating north break up before the nesting season.
Over most of the continent, Robins summer where there are trees for nest sites and mud for nest-builing material. The Robin's song is the earliest one heard in spring and summer, beginning just before the break of dawn.
Diet:
Mostly insects, berries, earthworms. Not a seed eater. Young are fed mostly on earthworns and insects. Does much of its forage for food on the ground, running and pausing on open lawn, apparently location earthworms by sight, not as suggested, by hearing them underground.
Nesting:
Males arrive at nesting grounds before females, and defend territories by singing, sometimes by fighting. In early stage of courtship, female may be actively pursued by one or several males.
Females does most of nest building. Site is a horizontal branch of a tree or shrubs, usually 5-25' above ground. Also nests on ledges of houses, barns, bridges. Nest is a cup of grasses, twigs, debris, worked into a solid foundation of mud, lined with fine grasses and plant fibers.
Eggs:
Usually 4, sometimes 3-7. Pale blue or "robin's-egg blue." Incubation by female, 12-14 days.
Young:
Both parents feed youth, though female does more. Parents very aggressive in defense of the nest. Male may tend the fledged young while female begins a second nesting attempt. 2 broods per season, sometimes 3.
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