194 BIRDS OF TUNISIA 



irregular winter migrant. When met with it is generally found in 

 small flocks, which frequent the vicinity of streams and marshy spots 

 where alders and similar plants flourish. Fir- woods are also favourite 

 resorts of the species. Its food consists to a great extent of aphides 

 and other small insects, as well as of seeds of various kinds. The 

 Siskin has a pleasant song, and being easily tamed, is very popular 

 as a cage-bird. The Tunis bird-catchers occasionally take it in their 

 nets together with Goldfinches and Linnets. 



CHRYSOMITRIS CITRINELLA (Linnffius). 

 CITRIL FINCH. 



Fringilla citrinella, Linn. Syst. Nat. i, p. 320 (1766). 



Chrysomitris citrinella, Boie, Isis, 1828, p. 322; Sharpe, Cat. Birds 



Brit. Mus. xii, p. 230. 

 Citrinella alpina, Loche, Expl. Sci. Alg. Ois. i, p. 155 (1867) ; Koenig, 



J.f. 0. 1893, p. 54. 



Description. — Adalt male, from Italy. 



Forehead and crown yellowish-green ; nape and sides of the neck slate- 

 grey ; back green, slightly streaked with dusky-brown ; rump green, quills 

 and tail-feathers blackish, slightly margined with greenish-yellow ; second- 

 aries and greater wing-coverts black, broadly margined with light green ; 

 lesser coverts bright green ; underparts yellowish-green, becoming dusky on 

 the flanks. 



Total length 4-50 inches, wing 3'10, culmen -40, tarsus 'GO. 



According to Loche, the Citril Finch occasionally visits North- 

 west Africa, specimens of it having been obtained in the neighbour- 

 hood of La Calle on the borders of the Algerio-Tunisian frontier. 

 The species, however, is probably of rare and merely accidental winter 

 occurrence south of the Mediterranean. Malherbe has recorded it as 

 occurring in Sicily in winter, but even there it must be rare, as there 

 is no Sicilian specimen of it in the Palermo Museum. 



In Corsica and Sardinia a brown-backed form of this Finch occurs, 

 which Dr. Koenig has named C. corsicana (Orn. Monatsber. vii, p. 

 120), and which is without doubt fairly separable. This form appears 

 to be resident and abundant in both the above islands, breeding even 



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