At the moment of this writing, the cones on the Eastern Hemlocks in the susquehannawildlife.net headquarters garden are being carefully dissected by a flock of Pine Siskins. A surprise invasion of these irruptive southbound migrants has gained intensity during the past week with hundreds being spotted daily at several of the region’s hawk watch lookouts.As the scales of a hemlock cone float to the ground like flurries of snow, this newly arrived Pine Siskin devours the seeds concealed therein. Its narrow, almost needle-like bill is specially adapted for extracting seeds from conifer cones, birch catkins, and the flowers of many herbaceous plants.Just like its close relative the goldfinch, the Pine Siskin is an accomplished acrobat at feeding time. Its sudden push through the lower Susquehanna valley was likely prompted by an exceptionally successful breeding season or a wild food crop failure in its more traditional wintering grounds to our north. Then again, a combination of these two factors could very well conspire to motivate the sudden exodus. With daily numbers of 100 birds or more already being recorded far south as the hawk-counting station at Kiptopeke State Park near the mouth of Chesapeake Bay, we can probably expect this invasion to entirely pass through our area with the birds ultimately spending the winter in the vast southern pine forests of the Piedmont, Atlantic Coastal Plain, and Gulf Coastal Plain.
