Just passing through

I know you really don’t want to be reading anything about snow in April, but please make an exception that I believe will be worth your while.

Just as we generally don’t see new snow at lower elevations in North Idaho now, we usually don’t see snow buntings this month. In fact, buntings are an unusual sight any time of the year, so they certainly are welcome now.

During most winters, we do see a few snow buntings on Rathdrum Prairie; one or possibly two flocks may be seen consistently for a few weeks or a month or so. I have seen flocks of 50 or more, but more commonly, they are in a smaller group that often will be hanging out with a small flock of horned larks, which also usually are found wintering on the prairie.

This spring, 10 or so snow buntings have been using the Rathdrum area as a refueling depot prior to their migration to the northern reaches of the Arctic. They no longer are in survival mode but are topping off their tanks for the long flights north. They may put on a third more body weight in stored fat for the trip, which will take them primarily through areas that have not yet heard of spring.

These are hardy birds, though, that choose to deal with snow and cold all year-round, so April in North Idaho must seem practically tropical to them.

In their wintering areas across southern Canada and the northern United States, they have been found to survive winter storms with temperatures of 58 degrees below zero. And when they arrive at their nesting grounds in another month, there still will be snow everywhere.

The buntings we are seeing now are the young males that won’t breed this year and the females. The older males already are arriving at their arctic summer homes to set up nesting territories, and they will have to deal with new snow and nights well below zero.

When summer comes, food will be plentiful there, but the rocky clefts and cracks that buntings favor for their ground nests are in limited supply. That’s why the males get going early – last man out has to sleep alone for the summer.

Being a ground nester in the land of arctic foxes, weasels and an abundance of ground squirrels makes it essential that the nests be well-hidden in the crevices or tiny caves.

Such places are permanent little refrigerators; even when nesting time comes, it is still so cold that the females incubate their eggs nonstop to keep them warm enough. So it is the responsibility of the male that chose the site to bring his mate-for-the-season breakfast, lunch and dinner in bed until the eggs hatch.

Not only does the male have to find food for two during this time, but he also must contend with the neighborhood air force of gyrfalcons, peregrine falcons and snowy owls. A birder’s paradise can be a bunting’s nightmare.

With food in abundance once spring hits the Arctic, buntings have little or no competition for that resource. The northernmost songbird breeders, they have a circumpolar arctic distribution that includes North America, Iceland, Greenland, Scandinavia and Russia.

Snow buntings flock only in nonbreeding time, but even in flocks, they are solitary birds. No matter how cold at night, they sleep singly in little scrapes they make in the snow, usually without even the cover of a tuft of grass.

When foraging as a flock, they move ahead in a rolling-looking fashion as the birds at the back constantly leapfrog to the front. While on the ground, they run – not hop – looking for seeds, and if you can sneak close enough, you’ll hear the constant bickering of birds that would rather not have to be so close to one another.

You can really see, when snow buntings are in flight, where they got their name. They are the only songbird to show so much white, and their appearance in flight has been described as that of “a large snowflake.”

At their breeding range, they are even more striking, with males being very fashionable in evening-wearlike plumage of black and white – no color anywhere. Even their legs, bills and eyes are black.

How do snow buntings get from here to there in terms of summer coloration? Well, it’s not due to molting the way you might think.

Snow bunting adults molt only in the summer before leaving the breeding grounds. Each new feather is multicolored from the tip to the base, and the tips are made to wear off easily. The new feather tips are a rusty-brown on the birds’ wings and back and a bright buff-cinnamon on their neck and head. In the fall and winter, males and females are pretty much indistinguishable from a distance. In the spring, however, as the tips wear off, the male’s head and chest turn all white and his back turns jet black. His tail and wingtips already were black.

The wearing of the feather tips is not, however, wholly a passive process. As males arrive in the Arctic, they spend a good deal of time rubbing themselves against abrasive iced-snow. In the process, they achieve their impressive black and white courting plumage. Oddly, even their white feathers are black along most of their length, but the white part does not abrade.

Females change color to a lesser extent. Their black areas actually are more of a deep brown and are streaked with gray. Their heads and necks are streaked a buff-gray, and only their undersides and parts of their wings are truly white. Throughout the year, females have less of a white wing area; this is especially noticeable in flight.

Both sexes also have white-edged tails and a black bill in summer that turns yellow when they molt.

Though they are called buntings, these birds actually are just fancied-up sparrows. “Bunting” is a mixed-up word that confusingly refers to many different types of birds in different parts of the world.

In North America, “bunting” is used in the name of a few sparrows and a few birds of the cardinal family. So, not all buntings are of the same lineage.

All, however, share a body form that the term “bunting” describes: plump.

Because birds can’t read their negative press, their self-esteem won’t suffer, but snow buntings variously are described as “plump,” “chunky” and “pudgy” compared with other sparrows.

It could be worse. One Eskimo name for the bird is Qaulluqtaaq. I don’t know if it’s a fat joke, too, but it sure doesn’t roll off the tongue the way “bunting” does.

I’m as sick of snow as anybody, but that sure doesn’t dampen my delight at hearing that spring snow buntings are about. And it was sure nice to have some of them in plumage that we don’t ordinarily see in the winter.

What I’d really like, though, is to see and hear a male snow bunting on territory, with falcons and owls flying over and weasels and foxes under foot. The Arctic must be quite the summer wonderland.