Fifty Finches

It was a tale of two places this morning with a couple of early morning phone calls, de-icer on the car windscreen here at home and headlights through the mist for more than half the journey to Will’s house about 17 kms away. In fact the weather forecast had been poor, with the BBC’s promised breeze absent at both ends, which probably accounted for the diverse weather.

In any case it was the first opportunity for a spot of ringing for a while, whereby Will’s feeding regime kept the titmice near the house and fiches near net locations for the last couple of weeks of wind and rain. One sixty foot net was all that was required for a good catch of finches before Will’s afternoon work and my babysitting beckoned.

In a three hour session we caught 58 birds, 54 new, 3 recaptures, and 1 bird controlled, i.e. it had been previously ringed by another ringer in the UK. New birds: 27 Chaffinch, 16 Siskin, 6 Brambling, 3 Goldfinch, 1 Blackbird and 1 Blue Tit. Recaptures were: 2 Chaffinch, 1 Dunnock and 1 Siskin, first ringed 11 months ago on 19th February 2010 .

Any claims for the control Siskin? Ring number T879956 - Age 6 Male, Wing 73 mm and weight 12gms at 0930.

So of our haul of 58 birds, 54 were finches, very much in accord with the birds in evidence around the confines of the garden or just outside in the nearby stubble field, with approximately 230 finches comprising 40+ Siskin, 20+ Brambling, 150+ Chaffinch, 10 Goldfinch, 2 Lesser Redpoll and 4 Greenfinch. And the blog header picture of a month or two ago finally proved predictive as the Siskins returned with a vengeance this morning.

Siskin
Goldfinch
Chaffinch
Siskin
Brambling

Of course finches are seed-eaters and raise their young on regurgitated seeds but also insects, while Linnets, Crossbills, Redpolls and Siskins are unique among birds in raising their young entirely upon seeds. Finch bills show unique modifications to help process seeds. Most have a groove in the palate that holds a single seed in place while the lower jaw crushes it and the tongue assists in peeling the shell. Finch bills can be thin, long, thick, or rounded, depending upon the specific types of seeds that are taken. Such specialization allows several species to co-exist within the same habitat. The seed-crushing bills of finches, which were adapted to various niches throughout the Galapagos Islands, proved integral to the formulation of Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection when Darwin noticed large differences in the apparently identical species on islands just miles apart.

Siskin
Brambling
Siskin

Other birds this seen morning, 2 Nuthatch, 4 Redwing, 3 Collared Dove, 6 Jackdaw, 5 Long-tailed Tit, 7 Blackbird.