366 U.S. NATIONAL MUSEUM BULLETIN 23 7 part i 



described it as the young of the gray-crowned rosy finch. He right- 

 fully expressed doubt about this identification, however, as the lat- 

 ter is cinnamon brown in body color and the new specimen was dari^ 

 gray or black. Nearly 4 years later five similar specimens of win- 

 tering birds from Colorado were sent him by Charles Aiken. These 

 he described and named the black rosy finch, calling attention to the 

 earher error. 



This species, like other members of the genus, breeds in the high 

 rocky regions above tree line in our western mountains. Groups 

 may be found rapidly working across a snowfield, each bird alter- 

 nately hopping and walking, gleaning insects which lie numbed on 

 the cold surface where they were carried by the wind from lower 

 elevations. The species is as characteristic of the mountaintops as 

 the rocks and the perpetual snow, as the tundra with its dwarfed but 

 brilliant flowers, or as the pipit and the pika. 



In winter the birds may be found in flocks with other rosy finches, 

 gray-crowned, Hepburn's, and, in central and southern Colorado, the 

 brown-capped rosy finch as well. The large flocks are closely formed, 

 the birds descending on a spot of bare ground to feed and suddenly 

 all abandoning the spot for another farther away 



Recently the taxonomic status of this bird has again come into 

 question. Mewaldt (1950) reported a specimen from the Bitterroot 

 Mountains on the Montana-Idaho border which was believed to 

 have characteristics of both black and gray-crowned rosy finches. 

 More recently a thorough investigation of that mountain range has 

 disclosed a zone at least 50 miles in length where complete and thor- 

 ough mixing of the two groups occurs. To the west, in the Seven 

 Devils Mountains near the Idaho-Oregon border, a similarly mixed 

 population was found in 1957 (French, MS.). These were only 50 

 miles from a previously described dark race of the gray-crowned 

 rosy finch, found in the WaUowa Mountains of Oregon. Thus a 

 broad zone of hybridization or intergradation exists between the two 

 supposed species. 



Nesting. — By early April the rosy finches have disappeared from 

 their winter haunts and begun to appear on the breeding grounds. 

 Bleak winter conditions still prevail at these high elevations when 

 the birds return. On such a day in the Wasatch Mountains of Utah 

 the birds were observed at 11,000 feet elevation. The snow lay 

 deep, and the only access to the area was on skis. The only bare 

 areas were the high rocky slopes blown clear of snow by the unceasing 

 wind. On these the rosy finches seemed to find seeds from the pre- 

 vious growing season lodged between the rocks and among the small 

 clumps of dried and abraded vegetation. A male black rosy finch 



