Snow Buntings Fly-By

Last week we had about five inches of new snow.  It stopped snowing Thursday, but all that grain that had been spread at Creamer's Field was covered, as you can see in this photo I took on Friday.

The geese and swans and ducks have delayed their flight north, but the Snow Buntings have still been active.  On Thursday I saw a large flock, somewhere between 100-150.  Click HERE to see a few close-ups from my last post.

At one point when they took flight they did a fly-by in front of the barns.

These little guys swirl around very quickly, and the result left the barns a bit out of focus.  I added some definition using filters in PSE.

Today is up around the freezing mark and the forecast is for warming this week.  Hopefully we'll get some melting and our avian visitors will decide to fly north!

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Check out more old barns at Tricia's Barn Charm!

The First Arrivals: Snow Buntings and Geese

Creamer's Field is ready for the arrival of the many travelers that will be dropping in very soon.  The front field has been plowed and two tons of barley has been spread to welcome them.  The first Canada Geese to arrive herald the arrival of spring in Fairbanks and after a long winter we are very happy to see them.  

Three intrepid geese were spotted on the field Wednesday morning.  The grain had not been spread at that time and they didn't hang around.  I don't believe any more have been spotted since then.  The average first date of arrival for geese at Creamer's Field is April 12th, and the earliest official date is April 2nd in 2010.  I stopped by yesterday and saw no sign of any birds, and today we drove by with our granddaughter Sydney.  We didn't see any geese, but her sharp little almost four-year-old eyes spotted birds flying in the field.  I did manage to get a couple of shots, but because they were far out in the field the shots really only serve for identification purposes.  After enlarging them on the computer I was able to confirm that they were Snow Buntings.  This was a first for me, so even though they were quite a ways away it was still exciting when I identified them.

They are the first migratory birds that arrive in Interior Alaska, and groups of males stop over on their way to the coastal tundra.  They arrive before the females and set up territories and select nest sites.  They generally are in flocks of 30 to 50, which is about what we saw.  They are 6-7" in length and are very fast moving.

I've upped the contrast and tried to make them more visible, but their black and white coloring blends in very well with the snow.  Click on the photos to enlarge them and hopefully you'll be able to spot these pretty little birds.  You can read more about them at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology by clicking HERE.

Until more birds show up we can still enjoy the beautiful views at Creamer's Field.  I couldn't decide which version of the two photos below I liked best so I've included both of them.