Jim Nickel brought up several species of finches in regards to a current thread of feeder birds so I thought I'd relabel the subject line and comment on his question:
" Another finch I wonder about is Cassinīs Finch. Has anyone seen one in Western Kansas, this year or in recent years? A couple of other winter birds I wonder about are Evening Grosbeak, and Common Redpoll. Will I see them in Kansas again?"
Unlike species like Pine Siskin and Purple Finch that occur annually in Kansas, in greatly varying numbers, the three finch species Jim mentioned all present interesting scenarios.
Cassin's Finch is a rare wanderer in Kansas. It may be overlooked, especially in western Kansas, but from eBird records there have been 6 reports for the entire state over the past ten years. One well documented report from 2017 in Topeka (KBRC record number 2017-22). There have been five reports from 2020 thru 2022 from Morton, Ford, Finney, Scott and Cheyenne Counties.
Redpolls (Common and Hoary are now lumped as one species) seem to show up a few every year. There was one reported from Cloud County just this past weekend (nice photos!). As I was looking at Kansas eBird reports over the past ten years I found that there were no reports for 2019 from the state. As I backed out to a larger view it appeared that there were very few reports in the central Great Plains that year (only 1 from Nebraska). In short they are around, but it is truly hit and miss to find one!
Evening Grosbeaks have been a periodic irruptive species. I remember the winter of 1985-86. My feeders in Geary County were emptied regularly by these yellow feeder pigs. Their numbers have really been dropping and the past 10 winters have seen few reports. Below are all the eBird reports, grouped by winter season. All of these have been single bird reports except the ones with asterisks (*) which were either 2 or 3 birds
Winter 2025-26 - 1 report, 1 Nov 2025 Winter 2024-25 - None Winter 2023-24 - 2 reports, Nov 2023, Jan 2024 Winter 2022-23 - 5 reports, Sep 2022, Nov 2022, Oct 2022, Mar 2023*, Apr 2023* Winter 2021-22 - None Winter 2020-21 - 2 reports, Oct 2020, Nov 2020 Winter 2019-20 - None Winter 2018-19 - 1 report, Mar 2019 Winter 2017-18 - 2 reports, Dec 2017*, Mar 2018 Winter 2016-17 - 1 report, Oct 2016* Winter 2015-16 - None
Fincing any one of the three species (Cassin's Finch, Redpoll, Evening Grosbeak) in Kansas is a rare matter of luck - be in the right place at the right time. BUT, keep the feeders filled and keep paying attention. Of those three species, you're best chance in the coming weeks is likely a Redpoll!
