Goldfinches

Our growth rate in Middle Tennessee is becoming unbearable, we are losing our farmland and forest at a great rate to developers daily, it’s sickening seeing all of the wildlife disappear all to bring traffic, and a horrible smell that now habitats my growing city.

Each year I am seeing more and more pollinators despair, birds, bees, butterflies are hard hit because not only do they lose their homes but they get hit by people using chemicals that will kill them to kill the very insects that birds and other animals that keep away, such as, mosquitoes and ticks along with other unwanted insects

Over the next few months, I want to write to you about each and how they benefit us and hopefully, I can reach out so you too can enjoy our pollinators as much as I do.  

I love my American Goldfinches they have a unique chirp that brings my garden to life. I started feeding them about 10 years ago and boy have they populated. When I first started feeding them I would buy one 10 pound bag of feed a month, now I do good to get by on 40 pounds in a month. I thankful they have populated over the years, it tells me one person can make a difference each year.

Goldfinches are very easy to feed all you have to do is buy a finch feeder and I recommend a metal feeder if you have squirrels because they just eat holes out of the plastic feeders to get to the seeds and some thistle seeds. The finches will eat seeds all the way until September then all the sudden they just quit coming to the feeders this is when they start nesting, they will usually come back to the feeder mid-October to start eating again. When they arrive back the males have changed color and will stay a light gray until spring arrives again. They also love to eat sunflowers, zinnias, and coneflowers seeds. 

You can barely see these beauties on the sunflowers 

My camera refused to focus on this juvenile in the background staring at me after I disturbed his feast on my zinnias. LOL

Goldfinches bring color and a wonderful sound as they sing to anyone garden as they feast. 

To learn more about their care please visit these links 

They do require trees for nesting so make sure you have a few large trees for them. To learn more about nesting click on this link.

https://animals.mom.me/goldfinches-nest-boxes-6877.html 

You can learn more about them and their song by clicking the link below.

https://abcbirds.org/bird/american-goldfinch/?gclid=Cj0KCQjw_absBRD1ARIsAO4_D3v2WUQQLoHisf1kOtal8GAMmsU-lwrTPJ0woc546N08muGmgNNakEEaArxoEALw_wcB