HOARY REDPOLL 405 



feeding iii situations suggestive of hunting for insects, as when a 

 pink-breasted male fed from tall willow branches carefully and quickly 

 searching stems and crotches. Leaves were not yet out on the 

 willows. Frequently the birds sought seeds. Another male was 

 seen foraging on the ground at the edge of slow-moving water under 

 the willows, and a parent from one nest foraged on the leaf-covered 

 ground under the willows. Willow catkins attracted the redpolls, 

 and they often probed the cottony willow pods. 



The adults fed the young a white mash of seed kernels which 

 between July 20 and 29 was determined to be composed almost entirely 

 of kernels of the seeds of cottongrass. The mash taken from one adult 

 collected had insect parts mixed in it. One juvenal not long out of the 

 nest was seen feeding at cottongrass, and the bird had cotton on its bill. 



The parents ate the egg shells after the young hatched and often ate 

 the nestlings' fecal sacs. One adult female was seen to feed its young 

 several insect larvae. Another adult redpoll was watched 15 minutes 

 while it industriously foraged at brown willow pods which were opening. 



As the cottongrass seed heads began to mature in late July, the 

 redpolls spent much more time on the open tundra away from the 

 wiUow brush, though the willow catkins also attracted them. By 

 August 1 1 the birds became much scarcer on the tundra, and examina- 

 tion of the cottongrass heads revealed few seeds left in them; some 

 only had empty husks. 



Field marks. — The smaller hoary redpoll is distinguished from the 

 larger Hornemann's (Greeland) redpoll (Acanthis h. hornemanni) by 

 its size and somewhat darker color. The hoary redpoll often associates 

 with the common redpoll (Acanthis f. Uammea) in winter flocks and is 

 distinguished from the latter at such times by its frosty appearance. 

 P. A. Taverner (1934) says of Acanthis h. exilipes: "Characteristic 

 adults [have] feather edgings light so that a typical bird looks like a 

 Common Redpoll * * * seen through a white veil * * *." However, 

 the colors are frequently so similar that many hoary redpolls "are 

 inseparable from the Common Redpoll except by other characters." 



Enemies. — G. M. Sutton (1932) says that jaegers and the duck hawk 

 are the principal enemies of the redpolls. Baldwin and Reed recovered 

 feathers of a hoary redpoll and a fox sparrow that had been fed to 

 two young duck hawks near their nest on a cliff at Umiat Mountain. 



Winter. — Grinnell (1900a) says that in the Kotzebue Sound region 

 in northern Alaska these redpolls — 



were present in unvarying numbers tliroughout the year. They were obviously 

 less noticeable up to the middle of September, or until the summer birds had all 

 left; but during the long winter, from September 15 to May 15, they were by far the 

 most numerous species. The days of extremest cold were invariably calm and 

 clear, and on such days one could walk scarcely a half-hour in any direction from 



