This is Bird Note.

It's early May.

We're standing in a large hayfield in western New York State,

where bobbolinks are returning to nest.

The males are first to arrive.

Their black and white plumage makes them look, it's been said, as if they're wearing tuxedos backwards.

In about a week, the females, too, will complete a round-trip journey of more than 12,000 miles from the Pompas of Brazil and Argentina.

Why are there now so many fewer Bobelinks than in decades past?

Probably because the landscape of North America has changed so much.

Bobalinks originally nested on native prairies of the Midwest and southern Canada.

When much of this grassland came under intense cultivation, they expanded their range eastward

to hay fields and meadows.

Bobbolinks like large, infrequently plowed fields that offer broad-leaved plants, under which

the females build their nests directly on the ground. In the northeast,

there are fewer hay fields, and many have been converted to alfalfa. Vegetation, bobble-inks

don't normally use. Also, hayfields are now being mowed earlier than they used to be,

and the mowing coincides with the peak of bobbolink nesting.

Okay. and the mowing coincides with the peak of bobbolink nesting. Support for federal and local efforts that conserve grassland habitat

can help these far-flying birds.

Learn more at birdnote.org.

I'm Michael Stein.