Gold Finches . . .

I first saw Gold Finches in Tucson, Arizona.  The wild bird store there had a huge sack suspended outside of the place of business and there must have been 30 or 40 Gold Finches feeding on it.  They would fly off as we approached to enter the store and were soon back on the sack so to speak when we went inside or just passed by.  Great advertisement.

This is my second year of suspending a Finch feeder out front in the oak tree outside of my den window.  And in the last couple of weeks I have seen the Finches working away at the feeder.  It has been suspended there for about two months, a bit early.   But they are on to it now.

The Finches have found the feeder and are eating away.  They are not golden yet, they have some yellow but sort of faded and are mostly brown.  As Spring approaches they will molt off their winter coats and their summer coats will be bright yellow, hence the name Gold Finches.

It is fun to watch them as they will feed upside down.  A lot of feeders provide short posts on top of the seed ports.  And thus only Finches will feed on them.  The feeder we have now has a steel mesh, with large enough gaps to allow the thistle seed to be plucked out.  So the Finches feed upside down or right side up, it does not matter to them.  They can grab on to the mesh and go to work.

I note that the feeder is already down about a third which means we are getting a lot of traffic.  We do not always see them and sometimes due to their winter coats you have study the feeder to see them.  And of course, they can feed anywhere and thus some of them are out of sight on the opposite side of the feeder.  The feeder is black and the thistle seed is about the same color, so it is a black tube suspended from a limb.

People often tie a bit of yellow ribbon on the feeder to attach the birds but I have found that is not the case.  The Finches seem to sense the seed and adapt to the feeder in record time.  Right now I see three of them on the feeder.

Nature at its best!