FINCHES 



bill, horn color, more dusky at tips ; iris, brown. 

 Adult Female: The red of the adult male replaced by 

 grayish-olive or olive-grayish overlaid with bright yel- 

 lowish olive or dull saffron-yellow, this brighter color 

 always evident on rump and sometimes prevalent over 

 under parts (except abdomen and under tail-coverts); 

 wings and tail, less dark, more grayish dusky. Young: 

 Wings and tail as in adult female ; upper parts, pale 

 grayish mi.xed or tinged with olive on back and 

 shoulders (sometimes almost white on head, neck, and 

 rump) everywhere broadly streaked witli dusky; 

 beneath, whitish, usually tinged with olive, conspicu- 

 ously streaked with dusky or dusky olive. 



Nest and Eggs. — Nest : Placed, like the White- 

 winged Crossbill's, in conifers, usually within jo feet of 



the ground; outside "wall" constructed of evergreen 

 twigs, shreds of bark, rootlets with a thick lining of 

 moss, leaves, grass, cottony fibers well felted together, 

 and generally some green bits of hemlock or cedar 

 tips. Eggs : 3 or 4, pale greenish, specked and spotted 

 with shades of brown and purplish gray. 



Distribution. — Northern and eastern North America, 

 breeding in coniferous forest districts from southern 

 Alleghenies in northern Georgia (sporadically toward 

 coast in Maryland, Virginia, etc.), Michigan, etc., to 

 Nova Scotia, to Fort Anderson in the interior, and to 

 western Alaska, and southward through Pacific coast 

 district to western Oregon ; in winter irregularly south- 

 ward to South Carolina (vicinity of Charleston), 

 Lnuisiana, Nevada, etc. ; casuallv to the Bermudas. 



The Crossbill is the only American bird with 

 the curious crossing of the bills. No group of 

 water birds or parrots or ducks or tropica! birds 

 of any kind have crossed bills. Only this one 

 genus of Lo.via in the Finch family is so pecul- 

 iarly fashioned. Because of this singular char- 



formed " bill. The process consists in inserting 

 the closed bill into the side of the cone, and then 

 opening the mandibles with a movement which 

 tears out the scales and thus leaves exposed the 

 seeds at their bases. These seeds are then 

 seized by the peculiarly shaped, scoop-like tongue. 



- "^^^ 



Drawing by R. I. Brasher 



CROSSBILL (1 nat. size) 

 Don't pity this bird because of his crossed bill; it 's exactly what he needs 



acteristic, they are among the most interesting 

 birds in the American avifauna. 



All-wise man has been known to point to the 

 Crossbill as one of the " blunders " of Nature, 

 and to sympathize with the poor creature thus 

 " deformed." If such an observer had taken the 

 pains to do a little real observing, he would have 

 discovered that the crossed hills are really a 

 special and very clever adaptation to the bird's 

 feeding habits. For an important part of the 

 Crossbill's diet consists of pine-cone seeds, and 

 these it rcadilv obtains bv means of its " de- 



By this operation the bird will cut an apple to 

 pieces in a few seconds to get at the seeds. The 

 mandibles are operated by muscles so powerful 

 that the bird will splinter solid wood with them ; 

 and they can be closed tightly enough to hold 

 the smallest seed. 



Many of the careful bird observers of the 

 northern States have never seen a Crossbill. 

 This is largely a matter of accident, the bird 

 student not happening to be at the same place as 

 the bird, whose wandering habits are very un- 

 certain. No one can expect to go into any piece 



