Radish, also called Chinese Moolah in India, is a prized root vegetable for many of us.

I have been saving some seeds of this plant from my garden. But same time, someone or something was eating up parts of the seeds. I did not know who or what it was, till I managed to catch the thief in my camera. It was a bunch of purple finches.

I did not mind too much, since I had already saved quite a few of them and did not need many more.

Back to the finches – it is not unusual to mix up purple finches with house finches, since the two look so similar.

Points to remember are – house finches are not normally fund near houses per se, and purple finches are not purple. In fact, the best way to distinguish them is to remember that house finches are present all across North America while purple finches nest only in Canada. Also, purple finches have far more read on their body and far deeper red too.

To further confuse the issue, there is a third look alike – the Cassin’s finch, that is also tossed into the mix.

Anyhow, these are the birds, like sparrows, that belong to the finch group with specialised bills to cross seeds, their primary source of food. And a bunch of them have discovered by daikon radish finches in my garden.