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

by Johann Matthäus Bechstein

THE COMMON LINNET.

Fringilla cannabina, Linnæus; La Linotte, Buffon; Der Lanning, Bechstein.

The length of this well-known bird is more than five inches, of which the tail measures two inches and a half. The beak, six lines long, is dusky blue in summer, and in winter greyish white, with the point brown; the iris dark brown; the feet, eight lines high, are black. There are some very striking varieties produced by the season and age in the plumage of the male, which are not observed in the female, and these have caused great confusion in works on birds, so much, that bird-catchers are still persuaded these birds, in a different dress, are distinct species.

Instructed by long experience and the observations of many years, I hope to show in my description that our common linnet (Fringilla Linota, Linnæus), the greater redpole (Fringilla cannabina, Linnæus), and, according to all appearance, the mountain linnet (Fringilla montana, Linnæus), are one and the same species. A male three years old or less, is distinguished in spring by the following colours, and by the name of redpole. The forehead is blood red, the rest of the head reddish ashcoloured, the top rather spotted with black; the cheek, sides of the neck, and the circle round the eyes, have a reddish white tint; the feathers of the back are chestnut with the edges lighter; the upper tail-coverts are black edged with reddish white; the throat and under part of the neck are yellowish white, with some dashes of reddish grey; the sides of the breast are blood red edged with reddish white, the sides of the belly are pale rust-coloured; the rest of the under part of the body is reddish white; the greater wing coverts are black, bordered with reddish white, the others are rusty brown with a lighter border. The quill-feathers are black tipped with white, the first are edged with white nearly to the point, the narrow beard forms a parallel white streak to the quill-feathers; the tail is black and forked, the four outer feathers on both sides have a broad white border, that of the two middle feathers is narrower, and reddish white.

After moulting, in autumn, little red is seen on the forehead, because the feathers become coloured from the bottom to the top; the breast has not yet acquired its red tint, for the white border is still too wide; but when winter comes its colours appear.

Males one year old have no red on the head, and more dashes of black; the breast is pale red waved with pale and dark, the under part of the feathers on the breast is only a bright reddish grey brown, the edges of these feathers are of a reddish white; the back rust-colour has some detached spots of dark brown and reddish white. These birds are known under the name of grey linnets.

After the second moulting, if the reddish grey feathers are blown aside, blood red specks may be discovered on the forehead, and the red of the breast is only hidden by the wide yellowish white borders to the feathers; these are the yellow linnets, or the rock linnets, as they are called in Thuringia.

I have myself taken linnets whose foreheads and breasts have been bright reddish yellow instead of blood red, a colour, in fact, that sometimes, in the house, becomes blood red. Bird-catchers give these also the name of yellow linnets. It is a deterioration of the red caused by illness during moulting, or by old age, and they are not wrong in regarding them as the best and the finest singers. I have taken several, but on account of their scarcity, I have always kept them for myself. Their song was very fine and clear, but they cannot be tamed, and have generally died soon of sorrow and melancholy, from which I conclude that they were very old.

Besides these three different varieties of plumage of the males, there are several clouded, produced by the seasons and old age; for instance, the older they become, the redder the head is. I have in my cabinet all the gradations of this change. Birds brought up in the house never acquire the fine red on the forehead and breast, but remain grey like the males of one year old; on the other hand, old ones, red when brought into the house, lose their beautiful colours at the first moulting, and remaining grey like the young ones, are no more than grey linnets.