The Natural History of Cage Birds / Their Management, Habits, Food, Diseases, Treatment, Breeding, and the Methods of Catching Them.

by Johann Matthäus Bechstein

The female is very different, being smaller, while the head, neck, and upper part of the back are greyish brown, and all the under part of the body is a dusky white, rather reddish grey on the breast; and the beak, greyish brown in spring, becomes greyish white in winter.

There are some remarkable varieties of this species, one quite white, another with a white collar, a third streaked, spotted, &c. There is no distinction between the wood chaffinches and those of the gardens and orchards, as has been alleged.

Habitation.—In its wild state, the chaffinch frequents forests, copses, and orchards, and ought to be reckoned among birds of passage, though there are always some that remain the winter with us. The time of passage, in autumn, continues from the beginning of October to the middle of November, and in spring during the month of March. These birds perform their journey in large flocks. In the spring the males arrive in separate flights, fifteen days before the females; our bird-catchers know this so well, that as soon as they perceive these they put up their implements, their sport being then over.

In the house, though each may vary the form of the cage to his taste, the best, in my opinion, is an oblong cage nine inches long, seven in depth, and seven in height, with the food and water at the two farthest sides, and the perches placed opposite. A bell-shaped cage does not suit the chaffinch, as it prefers jumping down in front, and swinging itself round, to remaining at the top. If there are several in one room they must be placed so as not to see each other, or their song will be injured. Those only are allowed to range whose song is very inferior, and must be provided with a grated place to retire to, or some branches to perch on. These never sing so well as those in cages, their song appearing to require the greatest attention, and hence there should be nothing to distract them.

Food.—When wild, their food in spring is all sorts of insects, which they carry to their young in their beaks; later in the season they eat various kinds of seeds, pine and fir seeds, when they inhabit forests that contain them, linseed, oats, rape, cabbage, and lettuce, which they know well how to procure and shell.

In the house they are fed all the year on rape seed, dried in summer, or, which is better, soaked and swelled in water, on which food they appear to thrive. Every day a sufficient quantity should be soaked for the next, and given them fresh every morning. In the spring they are allowed a little hemp-seed, or the seed of the nettle-hemp (Galeopsis Tetrahit), to excite their song, and this plant is therefore very much prized in Thuringia; but these seeds should not be mixed with the rape, as in trying to find them they soon scatter their food; it is best to put it in a separate drawer fastened to the iron wires of the cage, between which it may be slipped. It must not be omitted to supply them with green vegetables, chickweed, lettuce, and the like; and in winter a piece of apple, meal-worms, and ants' eggs agree with them. They must have fresh water regularly every day, both to drink and bathe in.

Those that range the room live on the different sorts of food they meet with, bread, meat, and all sorts of seeds.

Breeding.—The nest of the chaffinch is one of the most beautiful of birds’ nests, and formed in the most skilful manner. It is the shape of a half globe flattened on the upper part, and so perfectly rounded that it has the appearance of having been turned on a lathe. Cobwebs[36] and wool fasten it to the branch, bits of moss with small twigs entwined form the ground-work; the lining is composed of feathers, thistle-down, the hair of horses and other animals, whilst the outer covering is formed of the different lichens that grow on the tree in which it is placed, the whole firmly united and well cemented. This outer finish is no doubt intended to deceive an enemy’s eye; in fact, it is very difficult, even with great attention, to distinguish the nest from the bark of the branch on which it is fixed.

The female has two broods in the year; she lays from three to five eggs, of a pale bluish grey, spotted and streaked with brown: the first brood (and this is confirmed in general by observations of other birds) rarely produces any but males, the second only females. Bird-fanciers can distinguish the one from the other before they leave the nest; the breast of the male already discovering a reddish tint, the circle round the eyes being yellower, the wings blacker, and the lines that cross them whiter, though in other respects it resembles its mother. If you wish to be quite sure, pluck some feathers from the breast of the bird you have taken from the nest, in a fortnight they will be replaced, and the presence or absence of red will infallibly decide whether it is male or female. As soon as the tail-feathers begin to appear they must be taken from the nest, to prevent the possibility of their ear being injured by hearing an imperfect song, for scarcely are the wings and tail half grown than these birds begin to warble, and to imitate the song of those around them.