Eurasian Siskin
Spinus spinus
Grønsisken er en lille spurvefugl i finkefamilien, som er udbredt i store dele af Europa og Asien. I yngleperioden holder den sig hovedsageligt til nåleskove, men kan resten af året ses i små flokke på jagt efter frø fra birk, el, lærk og rødgran.
A small with a short, clearly forked tail and a small, sharp, conical bill. Yellow-green with dark streaking and a broad yellow ; the male also has a distinct black and a black bib. In flight it is that broad yellow bar and the deeply forked tail that catch the eye.
Can be confused with
- European Greenfinch — Greenfinch is clearly larger and compact with a strikingly thick bill, plain and unstreaked; Siskin is small, slight and heavily streaked, the male with a black crown and chin.
- European Goldfinch — Goldfinch has a sandy-brown body and a black-and-white head, with one broad yellow bar in a black wing. Siskin is yellow-green and streaked throughout.
Plumage and variation
Male and female: The male is easily told by the yellow-green plumage, the yellow panels in the tail, the yellow wing bars and the black chin patch. The female is mostly grey-green and streaked, but still shows a clear yellow wing bar and yellow edges to the tail.
Voice
The call is fine and clear, almost hissing and two-noted — "sy-li" or "si-ly" — and is often heard from birds in flight. The song is a lively, rapid twitter with the call mixed in, often ending in a drawn-out "æææh" reminiscent of Greenfinch.
Behaviour
In the breeding season it lives hidden in dense conifers and is little seen. Outside it, it is highly sociable and moves in noisy flocks that flit along in bounding flight over the treetops. Clambers about the outer twigs and cones with the same light acrobatics as a tit, prising out the seeds; in winter alder cones are an important food. A regular at feeders and hanging fat balls.
When and where
A scarce Danish breeder, put at 100-500 pairs in 2024 and 106 pairs in 2018 — figures that show not a direction but a population that swings. The 2019 Red List has it as Near Threatened with fewer than 1,500 mature individuals and states the trend explicitly as unknown, because of those swings. Numbers depend on the spruce seed crop, and in poor seed years the species may give up breeding here altogether. It is, on the other hand, a very common passage and winter visitor from the north, arriving in great numbers every few years after a particularly good seed crop.
Facts
Wingspan
21 cm
Conservation status
ikke truet
Relatives
Family
finches
Fringillidae
Order
passerines
Passeriformes
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