Fróðskaparrit - 31.12.2000, Side 29

SNJOFUGLUR (PLECTROPHENAX NIVALIS) TIL MATNAIØKINUM RUNT SUBARKTIS 33
Fig. 1. Snjófuglur, Snow Bunting,
Plectrophenax nivalis
(Olof Rudbeck, 1987(1695))
for food in many parts of the northern cir-
cumpolar area, particularly during its
spring migration. The males arrive first at
the breeding grounds in the northern cir-
cumpolar areas, and the females join a
month later. Food is available around hu-
man settlements, where manure from ani-
mals, as well as a somewhat higher temper-
ature, create fertile soil conditions for the
vegetation eaten by the birds in the spring-
time. Huge flocks of male birds, therefore,
seek out inhabited areas, where they are ob-
served and sometimes hunted by the local
inhabitants (Tinbergen, 1939; Parmelee,
1968: 1668-1671).
As early as 1740, Carl Linnaeus (1740:
367) wrote that the snow bunting makes a
delicious repast, especially when it is fat,
and that in its taste it closely resembles the
ortolan (Emberiza hortulana), a bird that
was greatly appreciated by the bourgeoisie
on the European continent. According to
Linnaeus, it was called ortolan de neige in
French, which was probably a commercial
name at the time, rather than a genuine folk
name. ‘Delicious birds to eat’, wrote Pehr
Gustaf Lindroth in a manuscript about
birds at Soderforsbruk in Uppland in the
late 18th century (Tyrberg and Haavisto,
1992: 57). In Moscow in the 1770s, snow
buntings were sold in bundles during win-
tertime as titbits, according to the Swedish
explorer, Johan Peter Falk (Falk, 1786:
397). Henry Linkmyer Saxby (1874: 93),
who knew the bird from the Shetlands, re-
garded it as “a perfect luxury for the table”.
“I must plead guilty”, he wrote, “to having
slain scores of them.” At the beginning of
the 19th century, moreover, there was a de-
mand for snow buntings in the Swedish
Royal Kitchen in Stockholm (Anonymous,
1875: 112). The interest in snow buntings
as a gourmet food survived into the early
20th century. This was a taste shared in
North America. In 1903, William Dutcher
reported that a state game warden had