484 



THE LAPLAND BUNTING. 



The Lapland Bunting, Snow Bunting, or Snow Fleck is one of our winter 

 visitors, and is known by a great variety of names owing to the manner in which 

 its plumage is coloured, according to the time of year or age of the individual. In some 

 places it is called the Tawny Bunting, White Lark, or Pied Finch ; in others the Mountain 

 Buntino-, because it is usually found upon the hilly ranges of the counties which it 

 frequents. 



It is an interesting bird, and has engaged the attention of almost every practical 

 ornithologist. It generally arrives in the northern regions of Great Britain at the end of 

 autumn, and remains during the winter ; the oldest birds always leaving last and keeping 

 towards the north, while the young birds arrive first, and go farther southward than their 

 elderly relatives. They generally congregate in little flocks, and may be seen scudding 

 over the snow-clad hills, their black wings and tail contrasting strangely with the pure white 

 surface over which they pass. Colonel Montague once shot more than forty out of the 

 same flock, and found that there were hardly any two specimens whose plumage was 

 precisely alike, the feathers varying from the tawny hue of the vouns bird to the pure 

 white and black of the adult in full winter dress. 



LAPLAND BVNTIiiG. — riectrdpkanes nivalis. 



While treating of this bird, Mudie gives the following interesting remarks. " There 

 is another trait in the natural history of birds, which, although it may be observed in them 

 all, resident as well as migrate, is yet so conspicuous in the Snow Bunting that this is the 

 proper place for noticing it. The male is the most sensitive to heat, and the female 

 to cold. That difference appears, whether the- result of the action of heat be change 

 of place or change of plumage. The males of all our summer birds arrive earlier than 

 the females, and in all resident birds the change of plumage and voice of the male are 

 among the first indications of the spring, taking precedence of most of the vegetable 

 tribes, for the redbreast and the wren sing before the snowdrop flowers appear. 



It seems, too, that the song and the attractions of the male are accessories in aid of the 

 warmth of the season, to produce the influence of the season upon the female ; and even 

 as the season advances, the female remains a skulking and hideling bird throughout the 

 season, at least until the young have broken the shell and require her labour to feed, and 

 her courage (which she sometimes requires to a wonderful degree at this time) to protect 

 them. Wliether it be that instinct leads the female to husband her heat for the purpose 

 of hatching her eggs, or simply that the thinning of the under plumage, which takes 



