336 Birds of Colorado 
Grey-crowned Rose-Finch. Leucosticte tephrocotis. 
A.O.U. Checklist no 524—Colorado Records—Allen 72, p. 162 (in 
part); Ridgway 73, p. 182; 75, p. 68; Trippe 74, p. 888 (in part) ; 
Drew 85, p. 16; Cooke 97, pp. 97, 164, 212; Henderson 03, p. 236 ; 
09, p. 235. 
Description.—Male in winter—Forehead and crown black, separated 
from the general brown colour of the body by an ashy-grey band running 
back from the eye and crossing the occiput ; wings and tail dusky black ; 
feathers of the rump and upper tail-coverts, the wing-coverts, the 
flanks and under tail-coverts all tipped with pink ; the outer primaries 
edged with the same ; iris brown, legs black ; bill yellowish with dusky 
tip. Length 6-30; wing 4:15; tail 2-60; culmen -40; tarsus -75. 
In summer the male has a black bill. The female closely resembles 
the male, but the black of the crown is not so distinctly demarcated 
posteriorly, and fades into the grey of the hind-neck ; the pink wash, 
especially on the flanks, is less pronounced ; it is also slightly smaller 
—wing about 4-05. 
Distribution.—Breeding so far as is known only in the higher moun- 
tains of California, in winter and during migration eastwards to the 
mountains of Colorado to Nebraska, Manitoba and Saskatchewan. 
In Colorado the Grey-crowned Rose-Finch is only a winter bird, and 
is chiefly confined to the mountains unless driven down by heavy 
storms, when it often resorts to ranches and to suburbs of towns along 
the foothills. 
The following are recorded localities: Gold Hill, Boulder co., Novem- 
ber and February (Gale), Magnolia, Boulder co., November (Sprague 
apud Cooke), Breckenridge (Carter), near Colorado Springs, January, 
February, March; Fremont co., April; South Park, January; between 
Rifle and Meeker at about 8,000 feet, October 27th (Aiken); Lake 
Moraine, slopes of Pikes Peak, 10,250 feet, December, and Crested 
Butte, 9,000 feet (Warren) ; Salida, December (Frey); a straggler to 
Fort Collins, March 31st (Cooke). 
Habits.—The Grey-crowned Rose-Finch is essentially 
a mountain bird, inhabiting the cold and snowy solitudes 
about timber line during the winter season, and appar- 
ently finding a subsistence on grass and other seeds ; 
it is usually met with in flocks. After a heavy storm 
in the mountains it is often driven down to lower 
elevations, and takes refuge in towns and villages. Mr. 
Aiken found an enormous number of this and other 
species of the same genus on such an occasion, crowded 
