Goldfinches have a strange, tie-dyed look these days, while they're in the process of exchanging winter's olive-drab feathers for a bright yellow coat. This happens slowly as spring advances, first with a few brilliant yellow feathers showing up on the throat, then the head, and finally the back. The birds look patchy until mid-May, when we can step back and say, "The goldfinches are back."
Of course, these chatty little finches have been around all winter, busily feeding from seed heads and feeders, but their cold-season look is so drab that they don't look like summer's birds.
And the birds we see all winter may well be different from our summertime goldfinches. Our birds may drift southward while birds from farther north flock in to spend the winter. Now that spring is on its way, those northern visitors are moving back home, to be replaced by birds that will raise a family here.
It must be a relief to them to shed those winter feathers, something like the way we feel when we can pack away those heavy down parkas and bring out the T-shirts and shorts. A goldfinch's winter feathers are heavier and denser than summer's, probably to provide more insulation.
Finch spring is later
No matter that cardinals and chickadees are singing merrily, it's not really springtime on the goldfinch calendar. These small seed-eaters are just about the last songbirds to nest each year, waiting until summer is well underway. Why does their breeding season begin at the hottest time of the year, after many other songbirds have already fledged a brood?
Here's a hint: Some people have suggested that a better name for these canary-like birds would be "thistle finches," to suggest the important role this plant plays in their lives.
Like other songbirds, goldfinches change into breeding plumage, sing their species' songs and select a mate in May or June, but they're just going through the motions.
