Now and then a passing bird, suspicious of my intent, stopped on some projecting point of rock, to utter the sole note which does duty for every mood, churkk or schthub, a sound comparable only to the concussion of a small taut rope on a flag-pole. Finally, near the top of the Sahale Glacier, I got a line at two hundred yards on an occupied fissure, and traced both parent Leucostictes into its distant recesses. Climbing cautiously up a sharp slope of ice, my footsteps were guided by the almost incessant clamor of young birds. Arrived at the upper lip of the glacier, however, I found that it stood away from the rock-wall some fifteen feet, and that a chasm some forty feet in depth yawned beneath. Into this forbidding bergschrund, one of the fledgling Leucostictes had tumbled. He was not more than two-thirds grown (July 18th) and down feathers still fluttered from his cheeks, but he was a plucky little fellow, and had managed to scramble up off the ice onto a piece of flat rock which caught a bit of the afternoon sun. Here, to judge from his lusty yelping, there could be no doubt that his parents would notice him, altho they would be powerless to secure his further release until his wings were grown. A Carnegie medal hovered suggestively over the spot, I know; but pray, consider,—the rock wall was perpendicular and smooth as glass, the ice-wall I stood on was undercut. No; even philornithy has its limits!
Taken in the Rainier National Park. From a Photograph Copyright, 1908, by W. L. Dawson.
A GLIMPSE OF MT. RAINIER FROM THE NISQUALLY GLACIER.
A FAVORITE HAUNT OF THE HEPBURN LEUCOSTICTE.
The nest containing the remaining youngsters was set well back in a rock fissure, concealed by projections eighty feet above the fallen first-born, and inaccessible to man from above or below. With the possible exception of the Black Cloud Swifts (Cypseloides niger borealis), who are reported to share at times these same cliffs, it is safe to say that the Leucostictes are the highest nesters on the continent.
No. 29.
REDPOLL.
A. O. U. No. 528. Acanthis linaria (Linn.).
Synonyms.—Common Redpoll. Lesser Redpoll. Linnet. Lintie.
Description.—Adult male: Crown crimson; breast and shoulders crimson in varying proportions according to season; frontlet, lores, and throat-patch sooty black; remaining lower parts white, flanks and crissum streaked with dusky; above, variegated dusky, flaxen-brown and whitish, the feathers having dusky centers and flaxen edgings; rump dusky and white in streaks, tinged with rosy; wings and tail dusky with flaxen or whitish edgings; two inconspicuous wing-bars formed by white tips of middle and greater coverts. Female: Similar but without red on rump and breast, the latter suffused with buffy instead; sides heavily streaked with dusky. Immature: Like female but without crimson crown. Length 5.50 (139.7) or less; wing 2.80 (71.1); tail 2.30 (58.4); bill .34 (8.6); depth at base .23 (5.8).
Recognition Marks.—Warbler to Sparrow size; crimson crown-patch in adults; no dusky spot on breast.
Nesting.—Does not breed in Washington. Nest: a bulky affair of twigs and grasses, lined with feathers and placed in trees and bushes. Eggs: 4-6, pale blue, dotted and speckled with reddish brown or umber. Av. size, .65 × .50 (16.5 × 12.7).
General Range.—Northern portions of northern hemisphere, south irregularly in winter, in North America to the Middle States, and southern Oregon.
Range in Washington.—Winter resident, abundant on East-side, infrequent or casual west of the Cascades.
Migrations.—Nov. 1-Dec. 15. Feb. 15-March 15. Yakima Co. Oct. 31, 1899. Chelan March 19, 1896.
Authorities.—Ægiothus linaria Cab. Cooper and Suckley, Rep. Pac. R. R. Surv. Vol. XII. pt. ii, 1860, 198. C&S. D¹. Ra. D². Kk. J. B.
Specimens.—(U. of W.) Prov. B. C. P.
Those who count themselves familiar with the Goldfinch are apt to let the first few flocks of Redpolls pass unquestioned. When, however, in late November, a norther brings down some thousands of these Alaskan waifs, the bird student is roused to attention. The resemblance between the two species is most striking in form and appearance as well as in habit and note. But once the eyes have been assured by a near revelation of convincing red, that Acanthis linaria is before them, the ears remark also a slight foreign accent in the sweetie call and in the rattling flight notes.
Redpolls summer abundantly along the coasts of Alaska, and along the higher levels down thru British Columbia. The winter movements of this species are irregular and somewhat confusing. According to Nelson, the western residents retire into the interior of Alaska to winter, where they are able to withstand the fiercest cold. The interior birds retire largely to the south, and under the urgency of bad weather sweep into or thru eastern Washington in immense numbers. There is also a small movement setting in a southwesterly direction, so that some birds winter regularly on Vancouver Island, and a few straggle thru the Puget Sound country.
REDPOLLS IN WINTER.