You can’t really talk about pink birds without talking about pink finches. For some reason the Fringillidae, as the finch family is called if you want to be highfalutin, frequently tend toward pink. Not that I’m complaining! To the contrary, I love spotting a pink finch, and the more out of place I am or the bird is the happier I am about it!
House Finch
Though its native range in the United States was just the southwest, the House Finch is now the most familiar pink finch in North America. It is rarely described as pink despite much evidence to support its place among the pink finches. Just look at the picture above of one eating a crab apple. How could that bird be called anything but pink? I am sure it was the first pink finch that I saw but, tainted by field guide descriptions, I never really considered it a pink finch until I stopped to think about as I wrote this blog post.
Purple Finch
Purple Finch, which are far too-often confused one way or another with House Finch, are completely misnamed. Not only are they not purple, but the field guides almost invariably describe their coloration as “raspberry.” Raspberry? Try pink! Purple Finch was the second pink finch that I saw though, once again, I never really realized that they were pink until now. It is amazing what words in a field guide can do to your senses.
Both of our redpoll species, Common Redpolls and Hoary Redpolls, have nice pink coloration. I spotted my first Common Redpolls way back in February of 2006, when I had been birding for less than a year and was still living in Albany, New York. I had to wait two more years and go out of my way to finally spot a Hoary Redpoll, the first pink finch I had to go out of my way to see. Both species are wonderful birds and every winter I hope that it will be an irruption year so that I can spot redpolls again.
It took a trip to Kazakhstan to see more pink finches. On a single wonderful day to the semi-desert of eastern Kazakhstan I added two pink finches to my life list, the Mongolian Finch at the top of this post and the Desert Finch above. Though both birds are actually mostly brown the pink on the wings and their sheer awesomeness qualify them for inclusion in the pink finch family. Someday I hope to go back and add Trumpeter Finch to my Central Asian pink finch sightings.
Though the Kazakhstan sightings are up there in terms of my favorite birding experiences my favorite pink finch sighting is a Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch. I put lots of effort into chasing one that showed up at the top of a mountain in New York in December of 2011 and dipped it. That made the second to show up in New York, in March of 2012, very important for me to see. The long round-trip to northern New York was well worth it, and I finally checked one of the three North American rosy-finches off of my life list.
What about you? What pink finches have crossed your path? And what pink finches would you like to see?
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It is Pink Bird Weekend on 10,000 Birds! Whether we are discussing birds shaded roseate, fuchsia, rose, coral, salmon, blush, or just plain pink, we have them all covered on Pink Bird Weekend. Why would we bother with such an esoteric topic? To put it simply, pink birds are awesome! Think about it, have you ever seen a pink bird and not wanted to see it again? Of course not! Make sure to check back all Pink Bird Weekend long as we delve into every possible pulchritudinous pink bird we can think of…
Oh come on – this purple finch is definitely dipped in raspberry juice!
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10150682527838037&set=a.10150682521438037.396261.587058036&type=3&theater
I see house finches every day! I’m rather fond of them; their song is the sweetest of the local garden birdsongs. I always thought of them as red finches, more than pink, though; maybe the ones in my neck of the woods have a slightly different colouring than yours. The one in your picture, there, is distinctly pink, but the ones I see on my balcony, and in the garden, are more of an orangey red.
Wait, what about Pine Grosbeaks? I know, they’re pretty red, but some can be on the pinker side. Why not?
Good point, William!
I’ve been feeding birds in my backyard for seven years. I’m an hour north of Toronto, in north Central Ontario. I get a large variety of birds in my tiny townhouse backyard, many of them colourful, like Robins, Cardinals, Blue Jays, Red Wing Black Birds, Black-capped Chickadees, Silver Belly Juncos, the odd White Release Pigeon who lost his directions to the wedding, Purple-headed Grackles, Speckled Starlings, and last week the first of the lemon Yellow Finches arrived, but they brought 4 guests, among which was one decidedly dusty-rose pink, swallowy-looking lad, the other three, pink-tinged juveniles or females. I had to look them up, but could not find them under any Ontario birds directory. So I opened my search to Canadians Birds. Nope, so I opened my search wider, to North American Birds, and there they were!
Pink Cassin’s Finch!
https://identify.whatbird.com/obj/316/overview/cassins_finch.aspx
I LOVE their cheery birdsong, even if they’re sitting on my upstairs bedroom window ledge at 4:30am EST, singing their pink heads off, as they’ve been doing all week. Must be all the millet and nyger seeds I’ve been putting out for them!
The good news is….they are building a wee nest on the top of my Christmas wreath, that hangs around the front, covered porch light, that I’ve been too lazy to remove. Well, it’s been snowing here the last six days, right up until a few hours ago, so it still feels Christmassy around here. I really wasn’t dreaming of a White Mother’s Day, yesterday, but there’s a first time for everything.
I can’t remove the wreath now, because a baby, or babies, seem to be on the way! YAY! I set up a private feeder for them. I don’t think there is an egg, or eggs, in the nest yet, and no thanks to the Corona Virus “stay at home!” orders in my town, we rarely leave the house, so for the finch’s sake, I hope the lockdown remains until their baby “pinks” fledge!
This is the FIRST time I ever remember seeing a pink bird of this variety, this far up in Ontario, and I’m honoured they chose my humble abode as their preferred place to hang out! I’d post a picture, but all I’ve been able to get are pink blurs, like a lipstick smudge. Maybe later, when mom’s in the nest.
Not since the orange Baltimore Oriole I saw 8 summers ago, or the Bluebird who briefly dropped by in 2011, have I seen such a rare and beautifully coloured bird, no offense to the large Pileated and the Red-Headed Downy wood-peckers who also are new arrivals to the backyard. And far be it for me to insult the regal Cooper’s Hawk, also a new guy in town, who dive-bombs my neighbour’s dense cedar tree in search of a swallow, to swallow.
Sigh.
Nature is both beautiful, and brutal, isn’t it?