Hawfinches are abundant in the oakwoods around Boisjarzeau this Spring; the birds stay high in the treetops but give themselves away with their clipped tsick calls. At the bird feeders, they sit in the basket of sunflower seeds and don’t give way to any of the mob of other finches and house sparrows.
The hawfinches have a chestnut cap and black band through the eye and a black beard beneath the huge silver blue bill; close up they look like masked muggers. Males have a rich chestnut cap and announce their arrival with a harsh tsi-sick such that the duller, younger birds and females usually clear off. But sometimes they don’t and the birds front-up to each other like sparring walruses.
Greenfinches and goldfinches are equally aggressive to each other; siskins are quick and pugnacious but inevitably get pushed away. Chaffinches and bramblings prefer to remain on the ground and feed on the spillage. Great and blue tits nip in and steal way with a seed when no-one is around. At the feeders, the inter-specific hierarchy is clear: hawfinch is king, then greenfinch, goldfinch, siskin and at the bottom house sparrow and great and blue tits. Size and bill shape matter.