SONG-BIRDS. Redpoll
Season : A winter visitor from the north.
Breeds : In boreal regions.
Range: Northern portions of Northern Hemisphere; south, irregu- larly, in winter; in North America, to the middle United States (Washington, D.C., Kansas. southeastern Oregon).
The Redpoll, Redpoll Linnet, or Little Snowbird, as it is locally called, comes out of the north on the snow clouds, with the Buntings and Crossbills, and returns to its breed- ing-grounds usually before its spring song is heard. It is most frequently to be seen in weedy pastures, where it feeds upon the seeds of small herbs, and after heavy snows have covered the lowlands it retreats to the manyvseeded composite; that swarm along the sides of grass-grown roads, and in an extremity, feeds upon tree buds, especially those of the black birch. It never becomes as friendly as its cousin, the American Goldfinch, but you can easily identify it and watch its movements when it is feeding upon some conspicuous spray that protrudes from the fresh snow. At such times a flock of Redpolls, with their little ruddy crowns, are the prettiest things imaginable, Thoreau’s soliloquy upon these winter birds, as he stood looking over the late November landscape, is too beautiful to quote merely in part. He says: “Standing there, though in this bare November landscape, I am reminded of the incredible phe- nomenon of small birds in winter, that erelong, amid the cold, powdery snow, as it were a. fruit of the season, will come twittering a flock of delicate, crimson-tinged birds, Lesser Redpolls, to sport and feed on the seeds and buds just ripe for them on the sunny side of a wood, shaking down the powdery snow there in their cheerful feeding, as if it were high midsummer to them. . . . They greet the hunter and the chopper in their furs. Their Maker gave them the last touch, and launched them forth the day of the Great Snow. He made this bitter, imprisoning cold, before which man quails, but He made at the same time these warm and glowing creatures to twitter and be at home in it. He said not only let there he Linnets in win- ter, but Linnets of rich plumage and pleasing twitter,
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