Ann's Bird Blog: November 2014

Monday, November 24, 2014

Finch Identification

Someone posted this on Carolina Birds on Facebook. He photoshopped it to put all these types of finches on it. I'm sorry I do not know whom to give proper credit to.

Supposedly we may get siskins and purple finches this year. I haven't seen a purple finch in twenty years - it would be a joy to have some at our feeder.

Roger Tory Peterson always said that a purple finch (lower left in picture) looks like it is dipped in raspberry juice. That's a perfect description of that little bird. The house finch is more red/orange, and its red is restricted to face/front and rump. The color is more distributed on the purple finch.

I do not think I would be able to distinguish the difference in the female purple and female house finches.

I would love to get siskins and purple finches this year.

How This Bird-Watching Happened

I'm always a little self-conscious and reticent about telling people that I like to watch birds. Somehow that hobby conjures up pictures of little old women in khaki shorts and boots, peering through binoculars at some little spot in the woods. Maybe wearing a pith helmet.

But birdwatching is something that really brought my husband and me together in the early years of our marriage. He was a huge hunter; I had never picked up a gun. We were very different. But we discovered that we were quite a team about birdwatching - I was the bookworm about them, and he had the outdoors knowledge to pick up sounds and motion in the woods. We kept lists and watched everywhere we went. I picked up some of his extensive knowledge about wildlife. And it was fascinating.

Even after our son was born, we still could keep up with this hobby somewhat. Our home had a great shelf feeder, directly out of our second-story bedroom window, that was about fifty yards from woods and stream. So we had great variety coming directly to our house.

After moving to Mike's hometown, the hobby waned. Two children, not a good location for much variety at a feeder, not as easy to take trips, either short or long ones. So it became an occasional thing rather than a main focus.

On our trip to the northwest, fourteen years ago, we put fifteen new species on our lists and got excited about it once again. And on our recent California trip, we got a few more.

Now that our children are gone, we're intent on watching birds again. It is still bringing us together. And we don't even need khaki shorts or pith helmets.