Twite (Carduelis flavirostris) Photo By Mike Pennington, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=13221949

Dear Readers, I always associate the Twite, an inconspicuous little  bird,  with the cold, windy hills of the Scottish Highlands in winter. It is very closely related to the Linnet, which it more or less replaces in upland habitats. When I lived in Scotland I would sometimes see flocks of Twite exploding out of the bushes at the side of a path, sometimes in surprising numbers. When feeding in fields (the bird relies on tiny seeds for food) its plumage would make it almost invisible.

You can also sometimes see Twite in coastal areas right around the UK. There are breeding populations in  Scotland and on the Pennines, and Twite often visit from northern  Europe during the winter. Alas, the breeding population is declining, with no birds now breeding in England, and the Scottish population also declining. In Scotland, it’s suggested that the marginal habitat adjacent to farmland was important for winter feeding and for nesting, but this is increasingly being taken into cultivation. Also, the bird uses hay meadows to find the little seeds that it feeds upon, and  these are becoming vanishingly rare.

Twite (Carduelis flavirostris) Photo Imran Shah from Islamabad, Pakistan, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0&gt;, via Wikimedia Commons

While the song of the Linnet was melodic enough to lead to the bird often being caged, that of the Twite has been compared to ‘electricity crackling’. See what you think…

In ‘Birds Britannica’, Mark Cocker and Richard Mabey comment that the Twite is the only European bird derived from Tibetan fauna – it’s thought that it spread from the Tibetan plateau into Central Europe), but after the Ice Age some birds went north (our population) whilst others followed the eastern edge of the ice back to central Asia. Apart from the population of Twite in Scandinavia, the closest relatives to ‘our’ birds now live in Turkey.

Twite (Carduelis flavirostris) captured at Langar, Ghizer, Gilgit-Baltistan, Pakistan by Imran Shah

Although they are the quintessential ‘little brown jobs’, Twite, like sparrows, seem to create a great fondness in those who see them regularly. Again, in Birds Britannica, a farmer remarks that she has started feeding the Twite and other birds, and that they follow her tractor, and even come to her voice when she calls them. And she says that she worries about them, although she says that this is unnecessary really, as they are ‘tough little birds’. I love how the living world can bring us such a sense of connection, if only we pay attention.