A BIRD MOUNTAINEER
By Charles Landes, Nature Guide.

Hepburn's Leucosticte, also called the Rosy Finch is a small bird, sparrow size, with brown plumage skirted with a rosy tint, and ashy gray on the sides of his head.

All mountain lovers and especially those who climb to the high places above snow line have noticed this bird. He alone of all creatures seems to be at home at these heights. Here in these inhospitable regions of snow and ice one sees little groups of finches moving about upon the snow fields and apparently gathering food from their surface. This upon close examination proves to be just what they are doing as the wind sweeping up the mountain drops many kinds of insects benumbed and helpless upon the snow.

This little bird is entirely independent of the scanty vegetation which follows the line of retiring ice and wrests its living entirely from the high altitudes in which he lives.

He utters but a single note yet in spite of his lack of vocal ability he is greatly admired by mountaineers because of his utter unconcern of glacier and cliff and the fact that he chooses such a habitat in preference to the much more hospitable flower strewn park lands farther down the mountain.

He builds his nest and raises his family in the high cliffs and so has few enemies except the cold fogs and blizzards that frequently come at this altitude even in the summer time.