American Goldfinch
(Spinus tristis)
eBird offers this description of the American Goldfinch: Small finch. Sharply pointed bill is pink in summer, grayish-brown in winter. Small head, long wings, and short, notched tail. Adult males in spring and summer are bright yellow with black forehead and wings. Females are dull yellow below and olive above with two distinct wingbars. In winter, they are drab, buffy-brown. Active and acrobatic. Sometimes in large numbers at feeders or on ground below. Found in weedy fields, cultivated areas, roadsides, orchards, and backyards. All About Birds offers this additional descriptive information about the American Goldfinch: This handsome little finch, the state bird of New Jersey, Iowa, and Washington, is welcome and common at feeders, where it takes primarily sunflower and nyjer. Goldfinches often flock with Pine Siskins and Common Redpolls. Spring males are brilliant yellow and shiny black with a bit of white. Females and all winter birds are more dull but identifiable by their conical bill; pointed, notched tail; wingbars; and lack of streaking. During molts they look bizarrely patchy.
I saw my first American Goldfinch on the afternoon of December 28, 2020 at my backyard water feature. The Goldfinch was with a mob of Pine Sisken and Golden-rumped Warblers. I was delighted to meet this beautiful little bird for the first time!
Cool Facts About the American Goldfinch From All About Birds:
- American Goldfinches are the only finch that molts its body feathers twice a year, once in late winter and again in late summer. The brightening yellow of male goldfinches each spring is one welcome mark of approaching warm months.
- American Goldfinches breed later than most North American birds. They wait to nest until June or July when milkweed, thistle, and other plants have produced their fibrous seeds, which goldfinches incorporate into their nests and also feed their young.
- Goldfinches are among the strictest vegetarians in the bird world, selecting an entirely vegetable diet and only inadvertently swallowing an occasional insect.
- When Brown-headed Cowbirds lay eggs in an American Goldfinch nest, the cowbird egg may hatch but the nestling seldom survives longer than three days. The cowbird chick simply can’t survive on the all-seed diet that goldfinches feed their young.
- Goldfinches move south in winter following a pattern that seems to coincide with regions where the minimum January temperature is no colder than 0 degrees Fahrenheit on average.
- Paired-up goldfinches make virtually identical flight calls; goldfinches may be able to distinguish members of various pairs by these calls.
- The oldest known American Goldfinch was 10 years 9 months old when it was recaptured and rereleased during a banding operation in Maryland.