The Death of the Cardinal Meadow Hawk Print

This painting shows a red winged blackbird about to pounce on a cardinal meadow hawk (a type of dragonfly). The dragonfly spends the spring as as an aquatic larva in the pond; it then crawls up a leaf into the air, and metamorphoses into the winged adult. Meanwhile, the red winged blackbirds migrate north from their winter retreats, returning to their native habitat to pair off and build a nest. These plants are called cattails. They are rooted in the water, which is not an easy trick because roots need oxygen but there is far less oxygen available in the mud of the pond than in dry ground. In this painting it is about mid-summer. The cattails have already been pollinated. The male (pollen-bearing) flowers had been on those white spikes you see rising up; now only the remains of the flowers are left. The female flowers are tiny and are clustered on those "corn-dogs". I would have tried to depict them clearly in the painting but at this stage in the summer they would merely be a pattern of light speckling and I decided to not bother. The blackbird almost entirely eats insects. It typically perches on one of the cattails and waits to see what insects pass by. In the moment captured in the painting, the bird sees the dragonfly, spreads its tail feathers, pushes off against the male spike of the cattail, and will have grabbed the dragonfly about one second later. Both bird and insect characteristically use this aquatic habitat dominated by cattails. The song of the male is short but charming: a sharp note that then slides into a trill. It is usually that song that tells you the red winged blackbirds have returned in the late spring, a song heard all over North America. I do not speak the language of red winged blackbirds but I bet the message communicated by this male is what seems to be the universal message of all males of all species at the start of a courtship: "trust me".