American Robin (Turdus migratorius): Facts, Diet and Nesting

Appearance

The American robin is a sturdy, upright songbird with a long tail and long legs. Adults have a gray-brown back, a dark gray to blackish head with broken white rings around the eyes, and a warm orange to brick-red breast. The throat is white with dark streaks, the lower belly and the area under the tail are white, and the bill is yellow, often with a dark tip in winter.

Males and females look similar, but males usually have darker heads and richer orange breasts, while females look paler and grayer. Juveniles, seen in summer, have a pale orange breast covered in dark spots, a reminder that robins are thrushes, a family in which many species have spotted chests.

Across the continent there are several subspecies. Birds from Newfoundland and Labrador are especially dark, western birds are paler, and a small, pale, non-migratory subspecies lives in the mountains of southern Baja California.

How big is an American robin?

The American robin is the largest thrush in North America and much bigger than the European robin.

Habitat and range

Robins breed across almost all of North America, from Alaska and northern Canada to the edge of the tundra, south through the United States to the highlands of Mexico. They live in open woodland, forest edges, mountain forests, farmland and especially in towns, where lawns, parks and gardens offer short grass for hunting worms and trees and buildings for nests.

In winter, many robins move south, but large numbers stay in southern Canada and the northern United States as long as they can find fruit. They are partial migrants, explained in more detail in where robins go in winter.

The species is a rare vagrant to Europe. Britain has recorded around 30 since records began, usually lost migrants that crossed the Atlantic in fall storms.

Diet: worms in summer, berries in winter

American robins are omnivores. In spring and summer, they eat mostly invertebrates: earthworms, beetle grubs, caterpillars, grasshoppers, spiders and snails. In fall and winter, they switch largely to fruit, including berries of holly, juniper, dogwood, sumac, hawthorn and crabapple. Over a whole year, fruit makes up a large share of their diet, often more than half.

The classic robin hunt is a run across a lawn, a sudden stop, a tilt of the head and a lunge into the grass to pull out a worm. Robins mainly use sight, but experiments have shown they can also find worms by hearing them. Find out more in how robins find worms.

Robins often gather where lawns have just been mowed or watered, because worms and insects are easier to reach. In fall, flocks sometimes feed on fermented berries and can become briefly unsteady, a behavior noted with firethorn (Pyracantha) berries.

What do robins do in winter?

Winter is when robins change their lifestyle the most. Earthworms are out of reach in frozen ground, so robins turn to fruit that stays on trees and shrubs, such as holly, juniper, sumac, crabapple and mountain ash berries. Because fruit grows in patches, robins stop defending territories and wander in flocks that can strip a laden tree in a day or two.

At night, wintering robins gather in communal roosts in dense trees, swamps or thickets. Some roosts hold thousands of birds. During the day the flocks spread out again to feed, often in woods and along rivers rather than on lawns, which is why many people never notice them until spring.

Robins handle cold well. They fluff out their feathers to trap warm air, and a robin can look almost round on a frosty morning. The bigger danger is a long freeze or deep snow that covers or uses up the fruit supply, which can push flocks farther south.

Behavior and song

In the breeding season, male robins defend territories and sing from high perches. The song is a clear, rising and falling caroling, often written as “cheerily, cheer up, cheerio”. Robins are among the first birds to sing in the dawn chorus, often starting well before sunrise, and they also sing at dusk. They also have a range of calls, including sharp “tut” and “peek” notes used as alarms.

Outside the breeding season, robins become social, roaming in flocks that follow fruit crops and gathering at night in large communal roosts in trees and thickets. In summer, males often roost together at night even while their mates are on the nest.

Robins are bold but watchful. A feeding robin keeps an eye on other birds and reacts quickly to their alarm calls.

Reproduction and nesting

The American robin is one of the earliest songbirds to nest in spring. The female builds a sturdy cup nest, usually 1.5–4.5 m (5–15 ft) above the ground in a tree fork or dense shrub, and often on ledges, porch lights or gutters. The outer layer is made of grass, twigs, paper and feathers; the inside is plastered with mud, then lined with fine dry grass.

She lays 3–5 eggs, usually 4, one per day. They are a famous clear sky blue, a color explained in why robin eggs are blue. The female incubates them alone for about 12–14 days.

The chicks hatch naked and blind. Both parents feed them, mostly on earthworms and insects, and carry away their droppings in neat white sacs. The young leave the nest at about two weeks old, often before they can fly well, and the male continues to feed them for a while as the female starts the next clutch. A pair commonly raises two or three broods between April and July, building a new nest each time.

How long do American robins live?

Most American robins live short lives. Only about a quarter of young robins survive their first year, and the average lifespan of a wild robin is about two years. The oldest robin known from bird banding records reached nearly 14 years old.

Predators and threats

Hawks, especially Cooper’s hawks and sharp-shinned hawks, are major predators of adult robins, along with domestic cats, owls and large snakes. Eggs and nestlings are taken by crows, jays, squirrels, snakes and raccoons, and fledglings on the ground are caught by cats, foxes and dogs.

The brown-headed cowbird lays its eggs in other birds’ nests, but robins usually recognize and remove cowbird eggs, so they are rarely raised as foster parents. Other threats include pesticide use on lawns, window collisions and cars. Robins are also an important host for West Nile virus, which is carried by mosquitoes.

Conservation status

The IUCN lists the American robin as Least Concern. It has a huge range, about 370 million birds according to Partners in Flight estimates, and has benefited from lawns, parks and gardens. In the 20th century, robins suffered heavy losses from the pesticide DDT, which poisoned earthworms in sprayed areas; populations recovered after DDT was banned in the United States in 1972. Today the species is protected under the Migratory Bird Treaty Act.

American robin vs European robin

When English-speaking settlers reached North America, they named this orange-breasted bird after the familiar robin of home. The two are not close relatives, and they are easy to tell apart:

The American robin is closer in size and shape to the European blackbird and song thrush, which belong to the same genus, Turdus.

Myths and facts

Myth: the first robin is a sign of spring. Many robins never leave their northern breeding areas in winter; they simply move into woods and switch to berries. What changes in spring is that they return to lawns, start singing and become much more noticeable.

Myth: it is the same bird as the European robin. The two share a name because of their orange breasts, but they belong to different families. The European robin is a much smaller bird, about 12.5–14 cm (5–5.5 in) long.

Fact: robins can be fooled by their reflection. In spring, territorial robins sometimes attack their own reflection in windows or car mirrors, mistaking it for a rival.

Relationship with people

The American robin is the state bird of Connecticut, Michigan and Wisconsin (see the full list of US state birds). It has inspired poems, songs and stories, and its egg color gave English the term “robin’s egg blue”. For many families, the first robin singing on a lawn is a cherished sign that the seasons are changing.