Bullfinch

A Bullfinch is a stocky, round-headed finch with a short, thick black bill. The male is hard to mistake: a black cap and tail, pinkish-red breast and cheeks, a grey back and a bright white rump.¹ The female has the same black cap, but her back is grey-brown and her underparts a soft greyish brown.²

Look for the wings and rump too. Both sexes have black wings crossed by one broad, pale grey bar, a white patch under the tail, and the white rump, which shows as the bird flies off. British and Irish birds belong to their own race, pileata, and males here are a little less bright pink than those in northern and eastern Europe.

A Bullfinch is 14.5 to 16.5 cm (about 6 in) long, with a wingspan of 22 to 26 cm.¹ Adults weighed by BTO ringers average 22.5 g (about 0.8 oz), and most weigh between 20 and 25.6 g. Females are slightly the heavier on average, at 23.0 g against 22.2 g for males, though males have the longer wings.³

British birds are slightly smaller and smaller-billed than those of northern and eastern Europe; across its whole range the species weighs 21 to 38 g.²

The sexes are easy to tell apart. The male's face and breast are deep pink; the female's are light brown or grey-brown, sometimes with a faint lavender-pink tinge, and her back is browner. Both have the black cap, the pale wing bar and the white rump.

Young Bullfinches have no black cap at all: the head is plain brown, the body buff-brown and the wing bar buff, but they already show the white or buffish-white rump. Birds in their first summer look like adults but have a pale horn-coloured bill.²

A male Chaffinch also has a pinkish breast, and the two are often confused. Look at the cap and the back: a male Chaffinch has a blue-grey cap, a chestnut back and a bold white shoulder patch; a Bullfinch has a black cap and a grey back. In flight, a Bullfinch's rump is white and a Chaffinch's green. A female Chaffinch has no cap at all. Side by side, with photos: Bullfinch or Chaffinch?

Bullfinches are quiet birds, and the call is often the first sign of one: a soft, low, slightly sad piping whistle, written "peu" or "deu", that falls in pitch. Partners use it to keep in touch, and it can be heard some distance away.² The RSPB notes that a Bullfinch is usually found by this mournful call.

The song is rarely noticed. It is quiet and varies from bird to bird, built from the call note itself, given singly or two at a time, and now and then a higher, longer piping note. Both sexes sing, though the male sings more often. Given in alarm, the call is repeated more insistently, and young birds' calls are louder and harsher.

Hear British recordings and see them drawn as spectrograms, with the song, how it is learned and the trumpet call of Northern Bullfinches: Bullfinch call and song.

Bullfinches live across Britain and Ireland all year. In the last national atlas they were found in 82% of the UK's 10-km squares in the breeding season and 84% in winter. They are commonest in lowland country with plenty of trees, especially in Ireland, and scarcest in big towns and the uplands. Treeless places are the gaps: the country around the Wash, the exposed western coasts of Ireland and many Scottish islands.³

Look in scrub, thickets, hedgerows and the edges of deciduous woods, and in orchards, mostly in spring. They also come into parks and gardens, to feeders and, in spring, to fruit trees, where they nibble the buds.

Listen for the soft, piping call, then search the edge of a wood or a thick hedge: Bullfinches are shy, easily disturbed and often keep to cover. They often feed in pairs, so look for a second bird. If one slips away from you, watch for the white rump.

Not in Britain and Ireland. Bullfinches here are resident and mostly move no more than about 20 km, though some may move up to 200 km in autumn and back in early spring.² Only a handful of British-ringed Bullfinches have been found abroad, in France, Belgium and Sweden; the longest move within Britain and Ireland on the BTO's records is 517 km, from Thetford in Norfolk to Bridge of Allan near Stirling.⁴

Northern Europe's Bullfinches are another matter: in some years they move far south and west, and some reach northern Britain. A young female ringed in northern Sweden on 22 September 2004 was caught on Fair Isle 26 days later, 1,283 km away. That autumn brought a record invasion of these Northern Bullfinches into Britain, many of them giving a distinctive call that became known as the trumpet call.⁵

Mostly seeds and buds. Bullfinches eat the seeds of trees such as ash, birch and elm, and of many wild plants, from docks and nettles to dandelions, chickweed and grasses. In spring they turn to buds and shoots, and are known for the buds of fruit trees. They also take berries such as rowan, blackthorn and blackberries, usually crushing the fruit for the seeds inside and dropping the pulp; with hawthorn they eat the flesh instead. Small insects, spiders and snails are a minor part of an adult's diet.² In Britain the chicks are fed a mix of seeds and small animals such as caterpillars, snails and spiders, with more of the animals while they are small.⁶

They feed in trees, bushes and tall plants, only now and then on the ground, perching sideways on a seedhead or a slender twig. An ash seed takes them 20 to 50 seconds to eat, and they can strip buds at up to 30 a minute.

More on the seasons, the buds and feeding them: What do Bullfinches eat?

The BTO says Bullfinches can often be seen at garden feeders. There they take sunflower and other seeds.² The Woodland Trust suggests offering seed and, if you have room, planting a fruiting tree.⁷

Feed with care. The RSPB warns that trichomonosis, the disease behind the fall in Greenfinches and Chaffinches, may now be causing a rapid decline in Bullfinches. It currently advises hanging feeders rather than bird tables or trays, pausing seed and peanuts from May to October and cleaning feeders weekly.⁸ More: feeding Bullfinches and attracting them to your garden.

Bullfinches nest in thick cover: a dense bush or hedge, often hawthorn, a tangle of bramble or honeysuckle, or a flat, low branch of a conifer such as a yew or spruce, at most about 5 m up. The male often picks the site and the female builds a loose platform of dry twigs with a cup of roots, grass, moss and lichen inside, building a new nest for each brood.² They are one of 15 songbirds that the BTO lists as likely to nest in farmland hedges.⁹

In Britain the first eggs are laid between late April and late July, on average around 17 May, and second broods follow. A clutch is usually 4 or 5 pale blue eggs speckled with dark brown and purple. The female incubates them for 14 to 16 days, both parents feed the chicks, and the young leave the nest at about 15 to 16 days old. Pairs raise two broods, sometimes three.³ In the breeding season the adults grow pouches under the lower jaw, in which they carry food back to the chicks.⁶ Bullfinches rarely use nest boxes, and are not on any of the BTO's nest-box lists.¹⁰

An active nest is protected by law: in England and Wales it is an offence to intentionally take, damage or destroy the nest of any wild bird while it is in use or being built,¹¹ and in Scotland and Northern Ireland¹² the law also covers reckless damage. Check hedges before cutting them in spring and summer.

Bullfinches are often seen in pairs, and the pair bond usually lasts more than one season. Partners keep in touch with soft calls and court each other all year, touching bills, and the male feeds the female. According to Birds of the World, the female is dominant over the male. They also gather in small groups of up to about 20, sometimes more.²

Pairs tend to match by age. A 51-year study of Bullfinches at Treswell Wood in Nottinghamshire found adults paired with adults, and first-year birds with first-year birds, more often than chance would give.¹³

A Bullfinch that survives to breed typically lives about 2 years, and breeds when a year old. Each year about 42% of adults survive to the next.³ The oldest on the BTO's ringing list was an adult male ringed at Childwall, Liverpool, in November 1965 and found dead nearby in January 1975, 9 years 2 months 9 days later.¹⁴ The European longevity list, which estimates age rather than time since ringing, has a German Bullfinch that a ringer caught alive at 18 years 1 month.¹⁵

The Sparrowhawk is the main predator of adult Bullfinches. Nests are raided by Jays, Carrion Crows, weasels and stoats, and small rodents.²

The Bullfinch is on the UK Amber List and is of Least Concern worldwide. The BTO estimated 265,000 territories in the UK in 2016, and UK numbers fell by 55% between 1967 and 2024. It was Red-listed until 2009.³

The fall began in the mid-1970s and was steepest on farmland. The BTO says the reasons are unclear: changes in adult survival may be important, and the loss of food and nesting cover, as farming intensified and woodland lost structure and plant variety, is suspected. Birds of the World puts the decline down mainly to fewer weed seeds as farming changed.² A 2001 review put the decline at 65% on farmland against 28% in woodland,¹⁶ and the steepest fall, a third, came between 1977 and 1982. Rising numbers of Sparrowhawks may also limit where Bullfinches can feed,¹⁷ and in north-east Scotland they rarely fed far from cover.¹⁸

The fall has not ended. Breeding Bird Survey numbers fell 21% across the UK between 1995 and 2024, 27% in the last ten years and 12% between 2024 and 2025; in England they fell 43% since 1995, while in Scotland they rose 55%.¹⁹ The RSPB warns that trichomonosis may now be causing a rapid decline.