Snow bunting

The snow bunting is a migratory, terrestrial granivore of grassland habitat, with a geographic range of 6,820,000 km². It lays one clutch of 5.2 eggs per year, incubates them for 12 days, reaches sexual maturity at 1 year and is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List.

Weight

35.3 g – 42.2 gsrc for Weight

Length

Not recorded

Wingspan

35 cmsrc for Wingspan

Lifespan

8.8 yearssrc for Lifespan

Diet

Granivoresrc for Diet

Longest recorded lifespan

9.6 years

Main food

Not recorded

Habitat

grasslandsrc for Habitat

Egg incubation

12 dayssrc for Egg incubation

Young per litter or clutch

5.23src for Young per litter or clutch

Age at maturity

12 monthssrc for Age at maturity

Litters or clutches a year

1src for Litters or clutches a year

Lifestyle

Terrestrialsrc for Lifestyle

Migration

Migratorysrc for Migration

Conservation status

Least Concern (IUCN)src for Conservation status

Countries on record

Not recorded

Not recorded

The snow bunting is listed as Least Concern on the IUCN Red List: it is not currently at risk of extinction.

1. LCLeast Concern
2. NTNear Threatened
3. VUVulnerable
4. ENEndangered
5. CRCritically Endangered
6. EWExtinct in the Wild
7. EXExtinct

Category via Wikidata (CC0). Find the full assessment on the IUCN Red List. See all Least Concern species.

1. kingdomAnimalia
2. phylumChordata
3. classAves
4. orderPasseriformes
5. familyCalcariidae
6. genusPlectrophenax
7. SpeciesPlectrophenax nivalis (Linnaeus, 1758)

Synonyms Calcarius nivalis, Emberiza nivalis, Passerina nivalis, Plectophenax nivalis, Plectophenax nivalis nivalis, Plectrophenax nivalis pallidior, Plectrophenax nivalis subnivalis

Catalogue of LifeWikipediaiNaturalistTAXREFWikidataWoRMSIUCN Red List

LC, Least Concern

McKay's bunting

Plectrophenax hyperboreus

Calcariidae

CompareSnow bunting vs McKay's bunting

• An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles · CC0 1.0 · E096-269
  Myhrvold, N.P., Baldridge, E., Chan, B., Sivam, D., Freeman, D.L. & Ernest, S.K.M. (2015) An amniote life-history database to perform comparative analyses with birds, mammals, and reptiles. Ecology 96: 3109. https://doi.org/10.1890/15-0846R.1. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.3563457.v1
• AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds · CC BY 4.0 · v7
  Tobias, J.A. et al. (2022) AVONET: morphological, ecological and geographical data for all birds. Ecology Letters 25: 581–597. https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.13898. Data: https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.16586228.v7
• Catalogue of Life eXtended Release · CC BY 4.0 · 2026-10-16 XR
  Catalogue of Life (2026). Catalogue of Life eXtended Release, version 2026-10-16 XR. Catalogue of Life Foundation, Amsterdam, Netherlands. https://doi.org/10.48580/dgzlf
• Wikimedia Commons · per file (CC0 / public domain / CC BY green, CC BY-SA amber, anything else not displayed) · 2026-11-11
  Wikimedia Commons contributors. Wikimedia Commons. https://commons.wikimedia.org (each file credited to its author under its own licence).
• Wikidata · CC0 1.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikidata contributors. Wikidata. https://www.wikidata.org (data retrieved via the Wikidata Query Service).
• Wikipedia (English) · CC BY-SA 4.0 · 2026-11-11
  Wikipedia contributors. Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. https://en.wikipedia.org (text under CC BY-SA 4.0; each block names its article and revision).

@misc{snow_bunting_2026,
  title = {Snow bunting (Plectrophenax nivalis)},
  author = {{CreatureData}},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://creaturedata.com/animals/snow-bunting},
  note = {Data as of 2026-11-11}
}