Wesley's Backyard Birds
House Finch

House Finches have always been a reliable bird to come to my feeders no matter where we lived. At this house so far the House Finches and Dark-eyed Juncos have been dominating my feeders. There's a good 30 or so that roost in the trees next to the barn behind our house that come to the feeders about every 15 minutes throughout the day, many times they'll just hang out. I see new ones regularly as their flock continues to grow, as the Dark-eyed Juncos have been dwindling as they migrate north. The Finches love the black sunflower seeds most but they're pretty messy and I'm having to clean them up often. The House Finch was originally a bird of the southwestern United States and Mexico. In 1940 a small number of finches were turned loose on Long Island, New York, and they quickly started breeding. They spread across the entire eastern United States and southern Canada within the next 50 years. The red or yellow color of a male House Finch comes from pigments that it gets in its food during molt. The more pigment in the food, the redder the male. Females prefer to mate with the reddest male they can find, perhaps assuring that they get a capable male who can find enough food to feed the nestlings. The Finches at my feeders are the Red, Orange, and Yellow variants.
House Finch - Male
House Finch - Female				House Finches & Dark-eyed Juncos
House Finch - Orange Variant
		< Orange Variant House Finch with Yellow Variant House Finch				< Orange Variant House Finch with a Goldfinch
House Finch - Yellow Variant