Goldfinch © Phil Jones
Goldfinches were somewhat less widespread in winter than during the breeding season, quitting some of their areas of lowest breeding density, including withdrawing from some of the highest altitudes. There is little difference in habitat occupation between the breeding and winter seasons. Most wintering birds were in farmland (41% of habitat records) and human sites (32%) with an increase in those in woodland (17%) and fewer in scrub (8%). A few birds were reported in seed-rich areas of semi-natural grassland and marsh. A total of 567 tetrads was used in both seasons, with 22 newly occupied in winter and 70 with breeding season presence but birds not found in winter. The empty tetrads are probably because birds have either migrated or joined local flocks. Although many British Goldfinches stay on or near their breeding grounds, most birds leave in the autumn to winter as far south as Iberia and Morocco (Migration Atlas). There have been fewer overseas recoveries of ringed birds in recent years, but this could be because hunting has decreased on the continent and this finding has not been tested statistically; the great rise in numbers wintering in the county suggests that the proportion of emigrants has fallen, however, perhaps driven by climate change.
Goldfinches form sizeable flocks, especially early in winter when there are copious supplies of their favoured foods, including thistles, burdocks and teasels. Some birds join Lesser Redpolls and Siskins feeding in alders and birches, but mostly they form single-species flocks to feed on plants where their long, thin bill allows them to exploit seeds not available to other birds; indeed, those able to perform the difficult task of extracting teasel seeds are mostly male Goldfinches that have slightly longer bills than females (BTO Winter Atlas). The median flock size reported by Atlas fieldworkers was six birds, but there were fifteen flocks of 50 or more, including two different groups of 150 birds but the largest was an estimated 280 birds found by Andy Ankers on Ince Marshes (SJ47T). Goldfinches also roost communally, and nocturnal roosts were reported in four tetrads, with the largest of 50 birds in a roadside hazel bush near Bostock Green (SJ66U).
The habit of visiting gardens was almost unknown twenty years ago (BTO Winter Atlas) but has become common since then. Thelma Sykes in 1988 described how Goldfinches were attracted to her garden at Saughall, near Chester to drink in warm, dry weather, and elsewhere, birds entered gardens to take seeds of ornamental thistles, teasel, lavender, cornflower, forget-me-not, Mexican aster, pansy and evening-primrose (Glue 1996). Some Goldfinches experimented with hanging on peanut feeders and eating sunflower seeds but the real breakthrough in garden feeding came with the widespread provision of niger seed, which closely approximates their natural food in size but is even more nutritious, containing some 40% of fat and 18% protein. Not only has this changed behaviour enabled many people to enjoy watching Goldfinches, but it may well have helped the species’ overwinter survival and assisted an earlier start to the breeding season. Just one (human) lifetime ago, they were scarce birds such that Boyd, on 12 November 1937, wrote ‘in much of Cheshire it is still almost an event’ to see one, and that they were seldom found in large flocks as in some parts of England (Boyd 1946).
Sponsored by Ray and Janet Thorp
