Birding: Grackle Animal Symbolism and Meaning
My husband’s favorite bird is the grackle. He learned to love them from his nature-loving Grandma Bertha in Wisconsin, whom he adored. This morning while reading my morning devotionals on the front porch, I heard a lot of interesting bird sounds. I turned on Merlin and it identified the cry of a red shouldered hawk and some grackle. I got up to see if I could see the hawk, but instead, I saw a flock of birds flying back and forth from a tree in my neighbor’s yard down to the ground and back.
I had taken my camera out with me, so I snapped a few pictures from far away. I told my husband about the flock, and he suspected they were starlings, but when I told him that Merlin had picked up a bunch of grackle noises and that they sounded like the grackle I’d seen in Wisconsin, we took a closer look at my photos. He agreed that they might be grackles.
While he was standing outside with me, the flock of grackles started flying over our yard to the other side of the property. He was specifically looking for purple coloring. As they flew over, we noticed the purple wings on some of them. Once the birds settled down, I sat back down to read, and my husband went back inside to work.
The next time I looked up, there was a big flock of grackles right in our driveway. I was able to sit in the rocker on my front porch and take a bunch of photos of them. I’m sharing some of the better ones in this post.
Grackle Animal Symbolism
Obviously, with this many grackles going crazy around our property, I felt the need to look up the animal symbolism for grackles. WhatIsMySpiritAnimal.com has a great description of grackle symbolism. I’ll touch on the highlights here.
Grackle Birth Totem
What really struck me was the description they gave of someone with the Grackle Birth Totem. Like I said, my husband loves grackles. The description they gave of someone with the grackle spirit animal sounded so much like my husband Dave, I laughed out loud.
“People born with the Grackle Totem Animal sometimes start life on the edges of society. People often misunderstand folks with a Grackle Totem because they care little about being “normal.” Such individuals understand themselves and celebrate individuality. There seems to be no need for change. Being funky and quirky is just fine.
If Grackle is your Birth Totem, you have a naturally happy, playful demeanor. You like activity and exploration, and it takes a lot to deter a personal quest once you set eyes on it. The Grackle within means you are an emotional being, and unafraid of expressing how you feel. Self-expression is healthy for you since keeping emotions bottled up creates physical or mental repercussions like anxiety. The only caution here is not letting your emotions color your perceptions so much it causes you to react before thinking.
You’re a master communicator. Witty conversation flows with ease, no matter to whom you’re talking. You have a healthy sense of humor, laughing long and loud when something strikes your funny bone the right way…While you are a simple person, there is genuine beauty and magic in your being.”
What Is My spirit AnimaL, “Grackle Symbolism and Meaning”
That description is my husband, Dave, in a nutshell!
Grackle Animal Symbolism
Many people see grackles and think they are common blackbirds, but grackles have beautiful iridescent purple and blue coloring. As you can see from my photos their coloring and iridescence varies from bird to bird. Grackles teach us that things are not always as they first appear. Take a closer look and you’ll notice more beauty and nuances you didn’t initially see.
Community and Socialization
Grackles travel in flocks. They are related to red-winged blackbirds. Unlike red-winged blackbirds, they nest in colonies and protect only their nesting area. You really don’t observe grackle mating, nesting, or feeding habits as pairs because it would tough to distinguish a single pair in such a large group.
The males are more iridescent than the females and the females have flatter tails. The mails fly with a V-tail flight during mating season. Females lay 4-7 eggs. They incubate their eggs for about 13-14 days and the babies leave the nest in about 12-16 days. The males might guard the nest while the female feeds, but he also might pair up with a second female at the same time. The female raises her brood by herself.
Grackle accept cowbirds within their group without a problem. I spotted a few cowbirds mixed in with the grackle flock I photographed.
Grackles can teach us to be more connected to our own communities and to welcome outsiders.
Intelligence
Grackles are smart. If food is dried out, they’ll soak it in a puddle of water to soften it. Grackles are hard to fool. You might try to scare them off with a scarecrow, for example, but quickly they’ll realize it’s not real.
Grackles teach us to be adaptable and discerning.
Boldness
Grackles will fly in and eat a French fry off your picnic table while you’re eating. In Texas they call them “taco raptors” because they’re so bold in stealing food. Grackles seem to know when it’s safe to go into new territory and when it’s not.
Their call is also quite bold. They can be very noisy when they come through in flocks. They have a variety of calls for different purposes and are very communicative. They are even so bold as to steal baby birds from other birds’ nests. They’ve been known to steal baby cardinals from their nests.
Maybe it’s time you spoke up, were bold, and went for what you want? Grackles show us how to do that. They also illustrate when you’ve really gone too far and have just become a nuisance. 😊
Want to be bolder in singing your soul’s song? Download my free “Soul’s Song Attunement” below and connect with your soul’s song just like the grackle does!
