THE PINE SISKIN. ^g 



No. 22. 



PINE SISKIN. 



A. O. U. No. 533. Spinus pinus (Wils.). 



Synonyms.— American Siskin; Pine Finch; Pine Linnet. 



Description.— Adult male and female: Above browmsh huffy below 

 creamy-buff and whitish ; everywhere streaked with dusky" or dark olive-brown • 

 the streakings are finer on the head and fore-parts, coarser on back and breast' 

 wmgs fuscous, the flight-feathers sulphur-yellow at the base, and the primaries 

 edged with the same color; tail fuscous, all but the middle feathers sulphur- 

 yellow at base. Bill comparatively slender, acute. Length 4.75-5.00 ( 120 6-127 ) " 

 wing 2.75 (69.9) ; tail 1.80 (45.7) ; bill .43 (10.9). 



Recognition Marks. — Warbler size; conspicuous general streakiness, sul- 

 phur-yellow markings of wings and tail, most noticeable in flight. 



Nest, of grasses, twigs and vegetable fibers, lined with hair, plant-down or 

 feathers, and placed, usually, high in coniferous trees. Bggs, 4, greenish or bluish 

 white, spotted with reddish brown. Av. size, .68 x .47 (17.3 x 11.9). 



General Range. — North America at large, breeding in higher latitudes and 

 in mountains of the West ; also, sparingly, in northeastern United States. 



Range in Ohio. — Common but irregular in winter and during migrations 

 in the north; less common southerly. Possibly breeds sparingly in northern 

 portion. 



THE Pine Siskin is one of those happy-go-lucky mortals (he is mortal, 

 is he not?) whose habits are the despair of all guide-books. We know him for 

 a northern bird, and by all analogies he ought to quit our hospitable woods not 

 later than the middle of May ; but with the most reckless unconcern he lingers 

 through May and into June,, until we are disposed to chide him for neglect 

 of the primal instinct, or else to wonder whether the rollicking, roving bands 

 may not have nests to watch that we know not of. Siskins have been found 

 in Northern Ohio during every month of the year, but whether they nest or 

 not is still undetermined. 



Their actions were still more puzzling at my home in Eastern Washing- 

 ton. There we lived not above twenty miles from the timber-clad mountains 

 where they might have been supposed to breed, and yet roistering troops of 

 them made free with the shade trees of our front yard, as the whim seized 

 them, throughout every month of the year, save winter. Either these com- 

 panies were composed of young bachelors too frivolous to love, or else they 

 were made up of communists whose lives were too happy in general to permit 

 them to think of particularizing in their afifections. A recent writer^ asserts 

 that they do nest in small colonies, three or four pairs in a tree, .and that it is 

 difificult to determine which particular bird is rnost interested in a given nest. 



1 C. W. Bowles in "The Condor," January, 1903, p. 15. 



