Bird Watching: Purple finch or house finch?, 1 by crowellli

crowellli wrote:
pelletory, that cornell pic helped a great deal. I had another pic of the same finch from the side and when comparing those two together, it's obvious mine is a house finch. I didn't realize their colors varied so much within the house finch. I've had some that are really tangerine color and others, like this guy, who are truly red. The house finch has a longer tail, the white bars and some brown on his noggin (technical term). Here is the side view that you can also compare to the cornell photo, if anyone else is interested in seeing the differences side by side. I want to do the Feburary back yard bird count, so I need to be able to tell these two birds apart. Now, if I can only figure out the different sparrows!

Thanks to all for the input.