Part 39

Coccothraustes vulgaris.

Lore, throat, and plumage at the base of the bill black; crown and cheeks reddish brown; nape ash-grey; back dark reddish brown; wings black; great coverts white; under parts light purplish red. Length, seven inches.

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The hawfinch has a somewhat curious history in this country. It was always believed to be an accidental autumn and winter visitor until, a little over half a century ago, the naturalist Doubleday, of Epping, discovered that it was a resident all the year round, and not a very rare species in that locality. Later it was found breeding in other places, and it is now known to inhabit all the Home Counties and various other parts of England. At present the belief is general that the bird is increasing in numbers and extending its range. This would seem the most natural explanation of the fact that the bird is often seen now in places where it was not seen formerly; but it must be taken into consideration that nobody looked to find the hawfinch when it was not known to be a British species, and that now many sharp eyes watch for it. As it is, we are seldom rewarded by a sight of it, even in localities where it is known to exist, in spite of its conspicuous colouring and the somewhat singular appearance given to it by its large head and massive, conical beak. Its excessive wariness prevents it from being seen even when it is not rare. No other small bird is so shy with us, so vigilant, and quick to make its escape at the slightest appearance of danger. When not feeding it passes the time in woods, plantations, and copses, at a spot where the trees grow thickest and the foliage is most dense. Its love of concealing itself in the deepest shade is like that of a nocturnal species. When away from its obscure place of refuge it is extremely alert, perching in the tops of trees to survey the surrounding scene, and from which to drop silently into any garden or orchard which may be safely visited. Naturally, it has been assumed that this shy and watchful habit has been brought about by persecution, gardeners and fruit-growers being deadly enemies to hawfinches on account of their depredations; but in the forests of North Africa, Mr. Charles Dixon found the bird just as vigilant and quick to take alarm as in England.

Hawfinches are rather silent birds: when flying from tree to tree in small flocks they utter a call-note with a clicking sound, and in spring the male sometimes emits a few low notes by way of song.

The nest is placed in a tree, or bush, or hedge, a thorn being the tree most frequently chosen for a site. The nest is rather large and well made, outwardly of twigs, dead stalks, and lichen, inside of dry grass, and lined with rootlets and a little hair. The eggs are four to six in number, pale olive or bluish green in ground-colour, spotted with black, and irregularly streaked with dark olive. In some eggs the ground-colour is buff. The young are fed on caterpillars, and only one brood is reared. After leaving the nest the young birds live with the parents, and sometimes several families unite into a flock; as many as a hundred birds, or more, may be seen together.

In autumn and winter the hawfinches feed on seeds of various kinds--hornbeam, beech, yew, and hawthorn. The kernels only of the haws are eaten; and, in like manner, cherries and other fruits are robbed for the sake of the kernel, the hard stones being split open with the powerful beak.

House-Sparrow.

Passer domesticus.

Lores black; a narrow white streak over each eye; crown, nape, and lower back ash-grey; region of the ear-coverts chestnut; back chestnut-brown streaked with black; wings brown, with white bar on the middle coverts; tail dull brown; throat and breast black; cheeks and sides of neck white; belly dull white. Length, six inches. Female: without the black on the throat, and upper parts striated dusky brown.

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More, far more, has been written about the sparrow than about any other bird, but as it is not advisable here to enter into the controversy on the subject of the injury he inflicts, or is believed by many to inflict, on the farmer and gardener, a very brief account of its habits will suffice. They are almost better known to most persons than the habits of the domestic fowl, owing to the universality of this little bird, to its excessive abundance in towns as well as in rural districts, and to its attachment to human habitations. For his excessive predominance there are several causes. He is exceedingly hardy, and more adaptive than other species; his adaptiveness makes it possible for him to exist and thrive in great smoky towns like London. He is sagacious beyond most species, and although living so constantly with or near to man, he never loses his suspicious habit, and of all birds is the most difficult to be trapped. He is very prolific: as soon as the weather becomes mild, at the end of February or in March, he begins to breed, and brood after brood is reared until September, or even till November if the weather proves favourable. He also possesses an advantage in his habit of breeding in holes in houses, where his eggs and young are much safer than in trees and hedges. There is a curious diversity in his nesting habits: he generally prefers a hole in a wall, or some safe, convenient cavity, and will make vigorous war on and eject other species, like the house-martin, from their nests and nesting-holes; but when such receptacles are not sufficiently numerous, or it appears safe to do so, he builds in trees, making a large, conspicuous, oval, domed nest of straw, mixed with strings, rags, and other materials, and thickly lined inside with feathers. Five to six eggs are laid, of a pale bluish white ground-colour, spotted, blotched, or suffused with grey and dusky brown. The young are fed on caterpillars; and the adults also are partly insectivorous during the summer months, but in the autumn and winter grain, seeds, and buds are chiefly eaten.

Tree-Sparrow.

Passer montanus.

Crown and back of head chestnut-brown; lore, ear-coverts, and throat black; neck almost surrounded by a white collar; upper parts as in the last; wing with two transverse white bars. Length, five and a half inches.

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By a careless observer the tree-sparrow would, in most cases, be taken for the house-sparrow, and not looked directly at. When we know that there is a tree-sparrow, and meet with it, we notice the chief points in which it differs from the common species--the chestnut-coloured head, with black and white patches at the side, and the double bar on the wing.

The tree-sparrow is locally distributed throughout England and Scotland, but is nowhere abundant; in Wales and Ireland it is rare. With us it is a shy bird, being found, as a rule, at a distance from houses, in fields, on the borders of woods, in thickets growing beside streams, and in fir plantations. In some districts on the Continent it is far less shy of man, and lives in villages and towns, where it associates with the common sparrow, and is said to be just as tame. In many parts of Asia it is still more domestic. Edward Blyth wrote of it: ‘In the great rice-exporting station of Akyab we have seen this species so familiarly hopping about in the public streets that it would only just move out of the way of the passers-by; and we have also known it breeding so numerously in dwellinghouses as to be quite a nuisance from its shrill, incessant chirping.’ This bird is the common house-sparrow of China and Japan, the Philippines, Burma, and more or less over the whole Malayan region.

In its habits it is more active and lively than its more domestic relation, and is more at home on trees, and may be seen moving about among the lesser branches and twigs with much freedom, sometimes seeking its food there, after the manner of the siskin and redpoll; but it feeds principally on the ground. It can scarcely be called a song-bird, its most song-like sounds being composed of a few chirruping notes uttered in the pairing season. Its voice, both in its attempted singing and in its ordinary chirp and call-notes, is much shriller than that of the common sparrow.

Like that species, it breeds both in holes and on trees. A hole in the rotten wood of a pollard willow by the waterside is a favourite site, and it also nests in holes under the eaves or thatch of a barn or other outhouse, and in holes in ruins, old walls, and rocks. The nest is made of dry grass, loosely put together, and lined with some soft material--wool, or feathers, or hair. Four to six eggs are laid, bluish white in ground-colour, the whole egg thickly mottled with brown of different shades. Two, and even three, broods are reared in the season.

In winter the tree-sparrows gather in small flocks, and are often found associating with the common sparrow, chaffinch, brambling, and other species. At this season they subsist principally on seeds of weeds and grass, but in summer they are partly insectivorous.

Chaffinch.

Fringilla cœlebs.

Forehead black; crown and nape greyish blue; back and scapulars chestnut tinged with green; rump green; breast chestnut-red, fading into white on the belly; wings black, with two white bands; coverts of the secondaries tipped with yellow; tail black, the two middle feathers ash-grey, the two outer, on each side, black, with a broad, oblique white band. Female: head, back, and scapulars ash-brown tinged with olive; lower parts greyish white; the transverse bands less distinct. Length, six inches.

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The chaffinch is one of the most popular song-birds in Britain; it is very much with us, being universal in its distribution in this country, and a bird that attaches itself to the neighbourhood of houses, an inhabitant of gardens and orchards, and a resident throughout the year. He is a pretty bird, and, if not a brilliant songster, is at all events a very vigorous one; his lively, ringing lyric, being short and composed of notes invariably repeated in the same order, is capable of being remembered longer and more vividly reproduced in the mind than any other song. Sitting by the fireside in January, you can mentally hear the song of the chaffinch; but the brain is incapable of registering the more copious and varied bird-music in the same perfect way--the music, for instance, of the skylark and thrush and garden-warbler. It is not strange that, when Browning wished to be back in England in April, he thought of the spring song of the chaffinch, before that of any other species.

O to be in England Now that April’s there; And whoever wakes in England Sees, some morning, unaware, That the lowest boughs of the brushwood sheaf Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough In England now!

The chaffinch makes the most of his song. He appears, indeed, very much in earnest in whatever he does, his character in this respect offering a strong contrast to that of the goldfinch, siskin, and various other melodists. They sing at all times, anywhere and anyhow. With the chaffinch, singing is a business just as important as any other--feeding, fighting, pairing, and building. He flies to a tree, and deliberately takes his stand, often on the most commanding twig, and there delivers his few notes with the utmost energy, and so rapidly that they almost run into each other, ending with a fine flourish. At regular intervals of a few seconds the performance is repeated, the bird standing erect and motionless all the time; until, having given the fullest and most complete expression to his feelings, he flies away, to engage elsewhere in some task of another kind.