[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

singing purple finch, pine warbler



Around noon Saturday in north Asheville, the rain stopped, the sun emerged
and I headed out for a walk.  As I stepped out the door, I heard a
finch-like song and then saw a red finch-like bird in the top of a Norway
spruce.  I grabbed my bins and identified the bird as a Purple Finch.  The
song strikes my ear as sweeter and more melodic than a House Finch, and the
call notes sound more like a goldfinch than a House Finch.

The Purple Finch hung around long enough to give a mini-concert before
flying off.  When it left, so did I, for a walk through the neighborhood.
A couple of blocks away, I heard a Pine Warbler singing from tall white
pines.  And a little later, I heard and glimpsed a couple of Pine Siskins.

Other songsters in the neighborhood lately have been cardinals, Carolina
Wrens, Song Sparrows, and Eastern Towhees, some of them sounding distinctly
in need of practice.  But the Purple Finch was at the top of its form.

Len Pardue, Asheville, NC