Icterids or New World blackbirds make up a family, the Icteridae, of small to medium-sized, often colorful, New World passerine birds. The family contains 108 species and is divided into 30 genera. Most species have black as a predominant plumage color, often enlivened by yellow, orange, or red. The species in the family vary widely in size, shape, behavior, and coloration. The name, meaning "jaundiced ones" comes from the Ancient Greek ikteros via the Latin ictericus. This group includes the New World blackbirds, New World orioles, the bobolink, meadowlarks, grackles, cowbirds, oropendolas, and caciques.
Icterid
Breeding male Brewer's blackbird apparently gaping (see text) in soil
Image: Yellow Headed Blackbird "Posing" for the Camera (22727158809)
Image: Bobolink at Lake Woodruff (Dolichonyx oryzivorus) Flickr Andrea Westmoreland
New World orioles are a group of birds in the genus Icterus of the blackbird family. Unrelated to Old World orioles of the family Oriolidae, they are strikingly similar in size, diet, behavior, and strongly contrasting plumage. As a result, the two have been given the same vernacular name.
New World oriole
Image: Scott's Oriole (Icterus parisorum) (14083421122)
Image: Icterus chrysater Turpial montañero Yellow backed Oriole (14868781704)
Image: Audubon's Oriole National Butterfly Center Mission TX 2018 03 04 15 14 28 2 (39971535194)
