Crossbill
Loxia curvirostra
Common (Red) Crossbills
Crossbills can be seen at Rannoch wherever there are conifers. They are a typical bird of the Caledonian pine forest and so the Black Wood of Rannoch is a good place to look for them but they are also present in the monoculture spruce or larch plantations. I have seen them in a number of places in the Black Wood and at the Craigour car park north of Pitlochry where they were feeding on Larch cones. John Taylor reported them from Tomphubil. They nest very early in the year, starting in January. They can do this because their food of pine seeds is available throughout the year. Sometimes they have been seen incubating when snow has landed on their backs. The most distinctive thing about crossbills, hence the name, is their crossed mandibles which allow them to extract the seeds from pine cones.
The numbers in Britain are very variable depending on eruptions from the populations in the taiga. They may stay in Britain breeding for a year or two and then return to the continent.
Crossbills are found right across Asia and North America.
They travel in small flocks and can often be detected by their calls. Listen to the ‘tweet of the day’ clip to hear the call.
Creative Commons - credit Elaine R Wilson
Male Crossbills.
Creative Commons - credit Richard Wiseman
Female Crossbill
There are three species of Crossbill that can be found in the UK - Common Crossbill, Scottish Crossbill (Loxia scotica) and the Parrot Crossbill. The Scottish Crossbill is Britain’s only endemic bird species. That said there is taxonomic debate as to whether is is a separate species. It is intermediate in size between the smaller Common (Red) Crossbill (Loxia curvirostra) and the larger Parrot Crossbill (Loxia pytyopsittacus). All three have very similar plumage. When the Parrot Crossbill irrups to Britain it is usually seen in the Northern Isles, Lewis and on the coast of East Anglia.