Finches are seed-eating birds characterised by a stout bill, which is used for husking grain.
The common sparrow (Passer domesticus) is the best known member of the finch family. Most of us see too much of him. He is to be observed in every garden on the Nilgiris, looking as though the particular garden in which he happens to be belongs to him. As a rule, sparrows nest about houses, but numbers of them breed in the steep cuttings on the road between Coonoor and Ootacamund.
The only other finch common on the Nilgiris is the rose-finch (Carpodacus erythrinus). This, however, is only a winter visitor: it departs from the Nilgiris in April and does not return until the summer season is over.