Sneeen

If you live in the mountains or on the Pribilof or Aleutian islands, you may find a particular gift for gardens that takes the form of the Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch.  This songbird loves the extreme environments, especially high mountains and freezing cold areas.  This medium-sized finch is mostly dark brown, although it does have some gray in its cheeks and some pink on its wings, rump, and belly.  Both male and female are colored about the same, while younger Gray-crowned Rosy-Finches are duller in color.  This bird lover’s gift mostly breeds in Canada and Alaska during the summer and spend their winders in the northern United States, mainly in mountainous areas.

There are actually six subspecies of the Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch.  Two, the ones that live on the Aleutian and Pribilof islands, are larger than the others.  In fact, they can weigh twice as much as some of the others!  The other subspecies can be found in mountainous areas and usually have brown cheeks, while the remainder have gray cheeks.  Because the Gray-crowned Rosy-Finch lives in very remote areas, they have no fear of people. I haven’t entirely made up my mind whether that’s a good or bad thing, but I’d love to find one sitting on a candle lantern on my patio one day.