So describes my history with the Pine Siskins. Pine Siskins are rare winter visitors to my backyard thistle feeder here in Northern Ohio. They are active, sociable members of the finch family.
Siskins like to live in wooded areas and usually nest in evergreens.
They summer in pine forests in northern states such as New York and Michigan as well as in Canada. They winter in the Southern U-S, so I usually see them as they migrate through. These small birds can easily be mistaken for a Goldfinch in winter plumage. The best way to tell them apart from a Goldfinch is the beak. The Siskin's fine, tweezer-like beak helps them extract seeds from pine cones.