Other Birds of the Sparrow Family 327 



Finley & Bohlman 



Young willow goldfinches in 

 cherry tree. 



larger than the sparrow. 

 It is mainly white, but 

 shows a good deal of 

 black on the upper parts. 

 It rarely perches in trees, 

 but walks on the ground or 

 snow and subsists on seeds. 



" Throughout Canada 

 and the northern tier of 

 states the snow bunting is 

 the familiar little white bird FIG. 203. 

 of winter. As soon as the 

 chill season comes on in icy 



rigors, the merry snowflakes appear in great flocks, and come 

 foraging about the barnyards when there is no bare ground 

 left in the adjacent fields. They get, apparently, but little to 

 eat ; but in reality they always find enough to keep them in 

 health and spirits, and are as fat as butter balls. In mid- 

 winter in the far North, when the thermometer showed thirty 

 degrees below zero, and the chill blizzard was blowing on the 

 plains, I have seen this brave little bird gleefully chasing his 

 fellows, and pouring out, as he flew, his sweet, voluble song 

 with as much spirit as ever skylark has in the sunniest days of 

 June. As long as the snow lasts the snowflake stays, and as soon 

 as the ground grows bare and there is promise of better days, 

 this bird of winter betakes himself again to the north as far as 

 the most northern habitation of man and there builds his nest." 1 



The snow bunting lives also in Europe and Asia. Why 

 are species that go far north likely to be found in both 

 the Eastern and Western hemispheres ? 



1 Ernest Thompson Seton, quoted in Chapman's Birds of Eastern 

 North America. 



