The eggs are three or four in number, tho sets of one and two are not rare in some seasons. They are a very pale bluish green in color, with dots, blotches, streaks, and occasional marbling, of rufous and brown, chiefly about the larger end. They vary considerably in size and shape, running from subspherical to a slender ovate. Measurements of average eggs are .68 × .48 inches.
Incubation lasts about twelve days, and the young-are ready to fly in as many more. The brood does not remain long in a family group but joins the roving clan as soon as possible. We suspect, therefore, that the Siskin raises but one brood in a season; and she undoubtedly heaves a sigh of relief when she may again don her evening gown, and rejoin “society.”
No. 31.
WESTERN GOLDFINCH.
A. O. U. No. 529a. Astragalinus tristis pallidus (Mearns).
Synonyms.—Pale Goldfinch. “Wild Canary.” “Summer Yellow-bird.” Thistle-bird.
Description.—Adult male in summer: General plumage clear lemon or canary yellow; crown patch, including forehead and lores, black; wings black, varied by white of middle and lesser coverts, tips of greater coverts and edges of secondaries; tail black, each feather with white spot on inner web; tail coverts broadly tipped with white; bill-orange, tipped with black; feet and legs light brown; irides brown. Adult female in summer: Above grayish brown or olivaceous; wings and tail dusky rather than black, with white markings rather broader than in male; below whitish with buffy or yellow suffusion brightest on throat and sides. Adult male in winter: Like adult female but brighter by virtue of contrasting black of wing and tail; white markings more extended than in summer. Female in winter: not so yellow as in summer, grayer and browner with more extensive white. Young: Like winter adults but browner, no clear white anywhere, cinnamomeus instead. Length of adult male: (skins) 4.71 (120); wing 2.95 (75); tail 1.97 (50); bill .41 (10.4); tarsus .55 (14.1).
Recognition Marks.—Warbler size; black and yellow contrasting, with conical bill, distinctive; undulating flight; canary-like notes. Feeds on thistle seed as does also Spinus pinus, a closely related but much less handsome species.
Nesting.—Nest: A beautiful compact structure of vegetable fibers, “hemp,” grasses, etc., lined with vegetable cotton or thistle-down, and placed at varying heights in trees or bushes, usually in upright crotches. Eggs: 3-6, pale bluish white, unspotted. Av. size, .65 × .52 (16.5 × 13.2). Season: July and August; one brood.
General Range.—Western United States, except the Pacific coast district, north to British Columbia and Manitoba, south to northern and eastern Mexico.
Range in Washington.—East-side, not common resident in half-open situations and along streams; resident but roving in winter.
Authorities.—Chrysomitris tristis, Brewster, B. N. O. C. VII. Oct. 1882, p. 227. (T). D¹. D². Ss¹. Ss². J.
Specimens.—P. Prov. C.
“Handsome is that handsome does,” we are told, but the Goldfinch fulfils both conditions in the proper sense, and does not require the doubtful apology of the proverb, which was evidently devised for plain folk. One is at a loss to decide whether Nature awarded the Goldfinch his suit of fine clothes in recognition of his dauntless cheer or whether he is only happy because of his panoply of jet and gold. At any rate he is the bird of sunshine the year around, happy, careless, free. Rollicking companies of them rove the country-side, now searching the heads of the last year’s mullein stalks and enlivening their quest with much pleasant chatter, now scattering in obedience to some whimsical command and sowing the air with their laughter. Perchic’-opee or perchic’-ichic’-opee, says every bird as it glides down each successive billow of its undulating flight. So enamored are the Goldfinches of their gypsy life that it is only when the summer begins to wane that they are willing to make particular choice of mates and nesting spots. As late as the middle of July one may see roving bands of forty or fifty individuals, but by the first of August they are usually settled to the task of rearing young. The nesting also appears to be dependent in some measure upon the thistle crop. When the weeds are common and the season forward, nesting may commence in June; but so long as thistle down is scarce or wanting, the birds seem loath to begin.
Nests are placed in the upright forks of various kinds of saplings, or even of growing plants, in which latter case the thistle, again, proves first choice. The materials used are the choicest obtainable. Normally the inner bark of hemp is employed for warp, and thistle-down for woof and lining, so that the whole structure bleaches to a characteristic silver-gray. In the absence or scarcity of these, grasses, weeds, bits of leaves, etc., are bound together with cobwebs, and the whole felted with other soft plant-downs, or even horse-hair. The whole is made fast thruout its depth to the supporting branches, and forms one of the most durable of summer’s trophies.
From four to six, but commonly five, eggs are laid, and these of a delicate greenish blue. Fourteen days are required for hatching; and from the time of leaving the nest the youngsters drone babee! babee! with weary iteration, all thru the stifling summer day.
During the nesting season the birds subsist largely upon insects of various kinds, especially plant-lice, flies, and the smaller grasshoppers; but at other times they feed almost exclusively upon seeds. They are very fond of sunflower seeds, returning to a favorite head day after day until the crop is harvested. Seeds of the lettuce, turnips, and other garden plants are levied upon freely where occasion offers; but thistle seed is a staple article, and that is varied by a hundred seeds besides, which none could grudge them.
Thruout the winter the Western Goldfinches are much less in evidence, the majority of them having retired to the southland at that season. Those which remain are somewhat altered to appearance: the wings and tail show much pure white, and the yellow proper is now confined to the throat and the sides of the head and neck. He is thus a lighter and a brighter bird than his eastern brother. But the western bird has the same merry notes and sprightly ways which have made the name of Goldfinch synonymous with sunshine.