...but some interesting things about this species. Norman van Swelm shared some recoveries of banded redpolls on the ID Frontiers list this morning. A redpoll banded in 9/98 in Norway was found 11/02 in China. One banded in China 10/01 was retrapped in Norway 2/03. A 1983 article reports a recovery in eastern Russia of a bird banded in Michigan. So these birds really get around. In the Mar 2003 issue of The Kingbird, the New York counterpart of the Ohio Cardinal, appeared a fascinating article about redpolls wintering in northern New York's snow belt in 2001-02. "Snow Burrowing by Common Redpolls" by J. Collins and J. Peterson offers careful observations of these birds bathing in snow, burrowing snow caves for roosting, and--seemingly playfully--making long tunnels and channels in snow. The authors suggest bathing improves the insulating qualities of feathers, and caves and tunnels promote heat conservation, and also that there appeared to be social functions to some of these activities. Maybe the advancing cold front will bring enough snow to the redpolls in Ohio's snow-belt counties that local observers can look for some of these activities and let us know what they see. In a related matter, several folks have mentioned that species of open fields like longspurs and snow buntings have gotten harder to find. It would be interesting to find if this is simply because of the absence of snow. With snow cover, these birds often gravitate to spots where wind, etc., have uncovered open ground---blow-outs, roadsides, and so on, making them easier to detect. I've looked at a snow-free fields with innumerable longspurs or buntings in them, and not noticed any until they took flight. These birds are probably still around; one way to test might be to throw out some cracked corn to see what happens. Bill Whan Columbus ______________________________________________________________________ Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society. Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list. Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/. You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]