CROSSBILLS AT WORK in 



that the birds are almost invisible when at work, while 

 even the red and orange-brown of the cocks is much 

 less visible than might be supposed, for this matches 

 the bright red-brown of the young pine-shoots and 

 the bark of the branches. 



In the low trees among which the crossbills spent 

 their day it was possible to see at close quarters their 

 method of dealing with the fir-cones and extracting 

 the seed. 



Many of the cones had fallen and were lying on 

 the ground. These the birds carefully searched 

 for. Half-a-dozen, both red and green birds, 

 would descend on to the bed of pine-needles and 

 inspect the cones. We do not remember to have 

 read any account of crossbills working on the 

 ground. They are less parrot-like than when in the 

 branches, for they hop instead of creeping like a 

 parrot. But if a cone is searched where it lies, the 

 bird throws one foot over it just as a parrot does, 

 rests its breast across it, and thrusts its mandibles 

 very deliberately into the interstices, just like a parrot 

 feeding. Often the bird picks up a cone in its beak 

 and flies into a low branch of a pine to extract the 

 seeds there. When feeding on the tree itself, the 

 bird holds the cone firmly in one foot, trying not 

 to detach it from the bough, and searches every side, 

 sometimes hanging head downwards, sometimes tail 

 downwards, and if the cone becomes detached, keep- 

 ing its grasp, and fluttering down through the pine- 

 tufts till it can catch hold of one with its disengaged 

 foot. 





