Overview

Pine Siskin: Small finch with brown-streaked body. Wings have small patches of yellow and two white wing-bars. Tail is dark, notched, and has small yellow patches. Bill is slender and pointed. Forages on ground and in trees for seeds and insects. Flight is swift and high, travels in compact flocks.

Range and Habitat

Pine Siskin: Breeds from southern Alaska, Mackenzie, Quebec, and Newfoundland south to California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Great Lakes region, and northern New England; wanders southward throughout the U.S. during winter. Preferred habitats include coniferous and deciduous forests, woodlands, parks, shade trees near human habitation, alder thickets, and brushy pastures.

Breeding and Nesting

Pine Siskin: Three to five green blue eggs with black and brown spots at large end are laid in a shallow nest made of bark, twigs, and moss. Nest is usually built in a conifer branch 10 to 50 feet above the ground, far out from the trunk. Eggs are incubated for approximately 13 days by the female.

Foraging and Feeding

Pine Siskin: Eats seeds of alders, birches, spruce, and other trees; also feeds on thistle and other weed seeds, forbs, buds, insects, and spiders. Attracted to salt licks and salt treated highways in the winter; sometimes drinks sap at drill wells created by sapsuckers; forages in trees and on the ground.

Readily Eats

Suet, Millet, Thistle, Sunflower Seeds (hulled)

Vocalization

Pine Siskin: Song is a husky, twittering warble, rising and falling in pitch and interspersed with a rapid ascending "ZZZzzzzzzzzzrree", which sounds like the equivalent of a bird with a chainsaw.

Similar Species

Pine Siskin: House Finch has a stubbier, thicker bill, longer tail with square tip, and lacks yellow on wings and base of tail. Common Redpoll has a red cap, black chin, and lacks yellow on wings and tail.