Siskin

A winter visitor and passage migrant in varying numbers, sometimes common although scarce in summer. 

The largest counts are of 530 along R Chew in early 1986 and a flock of 300 at New Passage on 20th October, 1975. 

Although Bland and Dadds (2012) say that breeding was first proved in 2009 the 2009 ABR merely says that there were records of juveniles from Bath, Weston and Cleeve without any further details. A female with a juvenile were seen in a Banwell garden on 25th June, 2013 but these were not thought to have bred locally. 

Wheeler (1874) said it was a ‘local winter visitor, occurs most winters at Stapleton and Leigh’ and Charbonnier (1899) ‘winter visitor, appears with fair regularity’. The 1928 SBR said it was a ‘somewhat erratic winter visitor but not uncommon in places where there are alders. Seen at Pensford and Hunstrete. Formerly quite common Leigh Woods but recent observers do not report it. Sometimes seen in former years at Backwell’. Davis (1947) called it a ‘winter visitor in varying numbers. Has frequently been reported and is evidently not uncommon wherever Alders occur’.