As a sequel to my earlier post for this bird, we picked up my brother-in-law, John Lichty, this morning to take him to see the bird which represents a lifer for him. When we arrived the individual banding the buntings had cages over the mounds of corn to lure the birds into the enclosure, from which there is no means of egress. Incredibly, three Snow Buntings and the Lapland Longspur entered one of the cages giving us very easy looks at our target bird. Then, a Sharp-shinned Hawk moved in and perched atop the cage. As one might expect the birds inside panicked and the hawk thrust its talon inside and grabbed the longspur. It struggled, (in fact it was pitiful to watch); the hawk attempted to get its beak in position to dispatch its prey when the bird bander moved in and scared it off. He examined the longspur and released it. It flew away, much to our surprise, and the Sharp-shinned Hawk zoomed after it, but appeared not to catch it. Whether it can survive this ordeal is open to question, but it would be interesting if someone else could report if the bird is seen again. The address shown on my earlier post is incorrect. The number of the house is 7165 NOT 71650. My apologies for this error. One we get our photographs downloaded I will post a report on my blog (see below). If anyone is interested they could check within the next few days and there will be pictures of the event. I doubt whether one could have a more dramatic lifer!
David Gascoigne Waterloo, ON www.travelswithbirds.blogspot.com _______________________________________________ ONTBIRDS is presented by the Ontario Field Ornithologists - the provincial birding organization. Send bird reports to [email protected] For information about ONTBIRDS visit http://www.ofo.ca/
