RUDDY-BREASTED BIRDS. Ill 



from Lake District northwards ; elsewhere rare and 

 irregular. More generally diffused in winter. 



The Crossbill is for the most part a winter visitant, 

 sometimes in great numbers, to the British Isles, 

 though breeding regularly to some extent in the pine 

 woods of Scotland and Ireland. It is of the bulk 

 and build of a Greenfinch, and, like these birds, roams 

 about in bands in the winter. At such times it is 

 a seed-eater, and frequents pines, larches, and spruce- 

 firs, prising open the cones with its crooked bill, and 

 clambering about the branches in the manner of a 

 Paroquet, which to some extent it resembles in its 

 appearance. The general red colour of head and 

 body in the male places it beyond the possibility of 

 confusion, for there is no other bird red above and 

 below save the Pine Grosbeak, a rare bird, very 

 unlikely to be seen. 



BULLFINCH— 6 inches ; male red -breasted, but black- 



cajaped and with gray back. 

 CHAFFINCH — 6 inclies ; red-breasted, but crown and nape 



slate-blue, and with a white patch on the wing. 

 HAWFINCH— 7 inches ; purplish below, ruddy-brown above, 



with white patch on the wing. 

 GREENFINCH— 6 inches. Though the female Crossbill 



might by its yellowish-green colour suggest the male 



Greenfinch, the bold yellow patclies on the wings and 



tail of the latter contrast with the almost uniformly 



brown wings and tail of Crossbills. 



NOTE TO 'RUDDY-BREASTED BIRDS.' 



BULLFINCH.— 6 inches. Since the female Bullfinch has not the 

 ruddy breast of the male, but both have a common feature in their 

 heavy black caps, this bird appears under ' Black-Headed Birds.' 

 A tree and bush haunting bird of .the garden, copse, and hedgerow, 

 with small, stout bill, in shape somewhat like a Parrot's. 



