We have frequently looked at finches in general. Now let's look at just one of them, the goldfinch, in more detail. This is one of America's most beautiful birds (often called a wild canary). The male is an exceptionally pretty, compact and neat little bird, particularly in the spring and summer when he is dressed in golden feathers with a contrasting jet-black cap, wings and tail feathers and pretty cross stripes of white. His legs and short, sharp beak are orange-brown. But in the fall and winter he changes the pretty gold and yellow to look more like the olive-gray female.
These birds fly in a rapid up-and-down wavelike motion. It is delightful to watch this display and hear their distinctive sweet melodies. They seem so happy in the way of life the Creator has arranged for them.
Nests are made of thistledown and fibers from various plants, woven with strands of grass into a soft nest where five or six eggs are laid and hatch out as cute baby chicks after about two weeks. While the mother incubates the eggs, her mate faithfully brings her quantities of seeds to satisfy her hunger.
The Creator has made the goldfinch a seed-eater rather than an insect-eater. Accordingly, He has arranged for their young to hatch out in the late summer, just as seeds are ripening with the most nourishment and are easy to pick. Thistle seeds are a favorite with them, and climbing about the stickery thistle plant does not seem to bother them a bit. But there is a variety of other food for them as well, including ripe berries, the seeds of grass, weeds, wheat, oats, etc.
Baby birds are not able to digest whole seeds, no matter how ripe and tasty. Until they are older and able to digest and gather their own food, the parents feed them by eating and digesting the seeds in their own stomachs (crops) and then, putting their beaks in the little ones' mouths, they cough up the digested food.
How did the goldfinch—and all other finches—know to delay their nest building until late in the summer? And how did they learn such an unusual way to feed their little ones? We know the answer: the Creator gave them the instincts to do these things when He first formed them, and each new generation does not need to be taught again because these instincts come naturally to them, just as the Lord God planned it.