Hawfinch

How to recognise it

• Very heavy triangular bill, blue-black in summer and bone-white or pale yellowish brown in winter
• Orange-brown head with a black mask around the eye, black bib and grey nape
• In flight, a clear white wing bar on blue-black wings and a very short tail
• The female is paler than the male, with a grey panel along the secondaries

Call and song

The call is an explosive clicking "zick" or "pix", and also a soft "srri" that recalls a Blackbird. The contact call is a hard "zicks", often heard in flight too. The song is heard mostly in spring and is quiet, with zick notes mixed with creaking and grating sounds.

Where and when

In Sweden the northern limit runs from southern Värmland via southern Dalarna to northern Uppland, and it breeds locally along the Norrland coast north to Norrbotten. It is especially numerous in leafy areas of Skåne, Småland, Blekinge, Västergötland, Öland and the Mälaren provinces. The Swedish population was estimated in 2012 at 17 000 pairs. It is reported from all 21 counties, most often in December and January.

Food and behaviour

In autumn the Hawfinch is very fond of cherry stones, and it also eats the seeds of rowan and whitebeam berries and various other seeds. It often feeds in flocks, especially in winter. It is shy and hard to observe, spending most of the day high up in the branches of trees. The nest is built in a fork between branches, usually high up in a deciduous tree.