American Goldfinch (click to see the larger version)

I saw my first juvenile American Goldfinch of the year at Montrose Point in Chicago this morning, August 17. Juvenile American Goldfinches are similar to the adult females except for their brown body color and wide buffy wingbars (adult females are green and have a narrow white wingbar). I’ve been seeing adult AMGOs at Montrose on almost all of my visits this summer so I’m fairly sure they nested there.

Because American Goldfinches are such late nesters they don’t start producing young until mid or late summer, well after most other species. In fact, many of the local nesting songbirds at Montrose, like Baltimore Orioles, Tree and Northern Rough-winged Swallows, and Red-winged Blackbirds have already migrated south.