Cold temperatures, raw wind, and snow – the necessary ingredients for Snow Buntings down our way. I saw my first flock yesterday at Fern Hill School’s Oakville campus – just north of Dundas Street/Highway 5 and 9th Line. The group, of about 30 individuals, was on its way south, keeping low and into the wind. Interesting place to see them as there is so much development in the area: big buildings (warehouses?) and Highway 403, 300 meters away. Maybe this is the route that they take between David Lamble’s banding site and ours. If these birds kept going straight they would have to cross Oakville, Lake Ontario, and Grimsby before reaching fields they could feed in. But they certainly can do it – this would be just a short jaunt for them.

Nancy had put out some cut corn at the Duxbury Road banding site a few days ago and yesterday she discovered a small mixed flock of buntings and Horned Larks feeding on it. She replenished the bait and then she and I put together the banding kit, ready for this morning.

All morning we had birds dropping into the bait/trap array. Up to 100 buntings (once, usually 20-30), up to a dozen Horned Larks and 2 Lapland Longspurs. The birds would fly in to the traps, feed around them or in the near vicinity, and then fly off. Some of them circled around and then returned…maybe time after time. But it appeared that many of them (the group of 100 for example) kept heading south or southwest when they flew up. None of them found their way into the traps.

In the early years I used to find this extremely frustrating. All the body English in the world (and even cursing) wouldn’t get them into the traps. But now….it doesn’t bother me….much. I call these early birds “teasers”. I know that if this weather continues we’ll soon have our first captures. Maybe even tomorrow….
Rick