Icterus galbula
Silhouette: Matt Wilkins · PhyloPic
In 3 days ~10% in a week ~30%
The Baltimore oriole (Icterus galbula) is a small icterid blackbird common in eastern North America as a migratory breeding bird. It received its common name from the resemblance of the male's colors to those on the coat-of-arms of 17th-century Lord Baltimore. Observations of interbreeding between the Baltimore oriole and the western Bullock's oriole Icterus bullockii, led to both being classified as a single species, called the northern oriole, from 1973 to 1995. Research by James Rising, a professor of zoology at the University of Toronto, and others showed that the two birds actually did not interbreed significantly.
The Baltimore oriole is the state bird of Maryland, and the namesake and mascot for the Baltimore Orioles baseball team. The Baltimore oriole was formally described in 1758 by the Swedish naturalist Carl Linnaeus in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae under the binomial name Coracias galbula. He specified the type locality as America, but this was restricted to Virginia in 1931. Linnaeus based his account on the "Baltimore-Bird" that had been described and illustrated by the English naturalist Mark Catesby in his The Natural History of Carolina... Wikipedia →
| # | City | Country | Daily sighting probability |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | San José | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica | |
| 2 | Guatemala City | 🇬🇹 Guatemala | |
| 3 | San Pedro Sula | 🇭🇳 Honduras | |
| 4 | San Salvador | 🇸🇻 El Salvador | |
| 5 | Minneapolis [Saint Paul] | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 6 | Detroit | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 7 | Boston | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 8 | Chicago | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 9 | Toronto | 🇨🇦 Canada | |
| 10 | Managua | 🇳🇮 Nicaragua |
| # | Zoo / Centre | Country | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | National Zoological Park | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 2 | Cleveland Metroparks Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 3 | Columbus Zoo and Aquarium | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 4 | Fort Worth Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 5 | Houston Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 6 | Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 7 | Philadelphia Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 8 | Akron Zoo | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 9 | La Paz Waterfall Gardens | 🇨🇷 Costa Rica | |
| 10 | Aviario Nacional de Colombia | 🇨🇴 Colombia | |
| 11 | Tracy Aviary | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 12 | Blue Hills Trailside Museum Habitats | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 13 | Florida Aquarium | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 14 | National Aviary | 🇺🇸 United States | |
| 15 | Ralph Perkins II Wildlife Center and Woods Garden | 🇺🇸 United States |
Rare
Under 5% of wildlife watchers report a Baltimore Oriole sighting in Puebla on a given day, based on 34 verified sightings from GBIF citizen-science data. It is the 97th most-seen of the 164 birds we can rate there. Over three days the chance rises to about 10%, and over a week to about 30%, if each day is a fresh chance.
February–April and December
In those months about 10% of wildlife watchers report a Baltimore Oriole in Puebla on a given day, against under 5% in January and May–November, the lowest months. Those are among Puebla's driest months, with about 15 mm of rain a month against 170 mm in September.
Between 8 and 11 am
Across all the parks we cover, that three-hour window holds the most Baltimore Oriole sightings with a recorded time, and about 9 in 10 of them come between 6 am and 6 pm: it is a daytime animal.
23rd of 36
Of the 36 cities where we can rate Baltimore Oriole sightings, Puebla ranks 23rd at under 5%. The best odds are in San José (Costa Rica, about 40%), Guatemala City (Guatemala, about 30%) and San Pedro Sula (Honduras, about 20%).
Same genus: Icterus
The closest relatives of the Baltimore Oriole that you can see in Puebla (genus Icterus, New World Orioles) are Bullock's Oriole (about 10%), Black-vented Oriole (about 10%) and Orchard Oriole (about 10%), with each one's daily chance of a sighting.
GBIF citizen-science records
It is estimated from how often the Baltimore Oriole is recorded against all the birds logged in Puebla (34 verified sightings), calibrated against known sighting rates. Figures are rounded to the nearest 10% because citizen-science data supports honest approximations, not decimals, and months with records from fewer than five people show "—". How it works.
