Quiscalus quiscula

The common grackle is an icterid bird found in large numbers through much of North America. It was first described in 1758 by Carl Linnaeus and has three officially recognized subspecies. Adult common grackles have a long and dark bill, pale yellow eyes, and a long tail. Adults often have a bluish iridescent appearance on their head, this feature being more pronounced on males. Common grackles can be found widely across North America east of the Rocky Mountains and are highly adaptable to their environment.

Quiscalus quiscula

Rhododendrites · CC BY-SA 4.0 · via Wikipedia/Commons. May be a photograph of a specimen, or an artist’s reconstruction — an interpretation of a skeleton, since colour and soft tissue are almost never preserved.

On record

Recorded, not inferred
Also called
common gracklePBDB
Sits inside
QuiscalusPBDB
Diet
insectivore, frugivorePBDB, for Icteridae
Life habit
volantPBDB, for Icteridae
Motility
actively mobilePBDB, for Theropoda
Environment
terrestrialPBDB, for Icteridae
Mass
92.2 gWikidata

Time the record covers

At least 2 thousand years on record.

The record covers at least 14 ka to 11.7 ka. No occurrence read is dated outside 210 ka to 0 Mya.

Pleistocene — about 5 of 6 occurrencesPleistoceneHolocene — about 1 of 6 occurrences213 ka–189 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences189 ka–166 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences166 ka–142 ka Mya — about 0.1 occurrences142 ka–118 ka Mya — about 0.5 occurrences118 ka–95 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences95 ka–71 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences71 ka–47 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences47 ka–24 ka Mya — about 0.9 occurrences24 ka–0 Mya — about 1 occurrence14 ka – 11.7 ka710 ka0 Mya

6 occurrences of Quiscalus quiscula on record, most of them in the Pleistocene. The Paleobiology Database records this as a living group. Bar height is expected occurrences, not a count: each fossil is spread across the span it is dated to, so a tall narrow bar means tight dating and a low wide one means loose.

When

6 occurrences

These are dates about fossils, not the animal: the record can only begin after it arose and end before it died out, so either end may reach further. Shares are expected occurrences: a fossil dated to a span is counted partly in each period it straddles. More on what this infers.

Quiscalus quiscula and its relatives

Pleistocene

Where Quiscalus quiscula and its relatives were recorded in the Pleistocene.

Found in the same rock

323 taxa

The Paleobiology Database records 6 sites for Quiscalus quiscula, and this reads all of them. The number is how many of those sites it was catalogued from too. The 24 sharing the most are listed.

This is not a list of everything alive at the time. It is only what has come out of the same ground as this animal and been written down.

Entered from

6 references

Each of the 6 occurrences read was entered from one of these publications, ordered by how many each accounts for. This is not a search for papers mentioning the name. Entries link to doi.org where the Paleobiology Database holds an identifier, and to its own record where it does not. Relayed as the Paleobiology Database holds them, not checked against what they resolve to.

Media and terms

Media content1

Picture of Quiscalus quiscula

Credit
Rhododendrites
Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0
Commercial use
the licence allows it

No 3D scan of Quiscalus quiscula was found in Sketchfab.

Smithsonian Open Access and MorphoSource were not reached for this taxon, so this list is what the others held rather than everything there is.

The description on this site

Licence
CC BY-SA 4.0

This is what the site found, which is not the same as what exists.

Keep going

What may have been alongside itQuiscalus through timeFormations of the PleistoceneThe world it lived on

Occurrence data from the Paleobiology Database, CC BY 4.0. (Linnaeus 1758)