Finches

Ordinarily, finches are my least favorite bird. Most of them are merely shades of brown and gray that can get very confusing. Identification often depends upon the habitat in which they are located. When I began birding (and sometimes when I'm bored) I simply labeled a quickly spotted finch as a LBJ bird. That's a Little Brown Job.

The exceptions are the American Goldfinch--in its bright yellow summer plumage--and the House Finch and Purple Finch with their red plumage. The problem I've had with the latter two is that they are very,very similar. All winter we've had Purple Finches coming to the feeders and I've had to look them up in the guide books time and again just to be sure. You see, The HOUSE FINCH is supposed to be the commoner bird of the two but we've had very, very few of them around. I managed to snap a few really good pictures of the Purple Finches and sent them off to my friend Gary, web master at the Tiadaghton Audubon Society to have him confirm that yes, indeed they were Purple Finches.

Well, today I got a chance to make a side by side comparison of the two and get a picture of it as well.

House Finch (l.) and Purple Finch (r.) share a perch.

The House Finch is the one with the brown stripes on its flanks in the rear. The Purple Finch is the punk one with more red on its chest and reddish stripes on its flanks in the foreground.