When Dave Boileau was out on a walk Monday evening near his home in Iqaluit’s Happy Valley, he saw a sign of spring that’s usually reserved for the South: a pair of chubby, red-breasted robins. Boileau, who always brings a camera with him on his walks, snapped photos of the birds before they flew off singing. ‘It was kind of neat,’ Bouleau said. ‘I thought they were snow buntings – before I noticed the red.’ This isn’t the first time that robins have been spotted in Iqaluit. During the summer of 1999, robins nested near the beach below Happy Valley. These robins, numbering at least two adults and a juvenile, were seen several times near the Iqaluit cemetery and along the walking trail to Apex. Since then, robin sightings have come from as far away as Baker Lake, Kugluktuk, Arviat and Rankin Inlet. Robins have also been sighted along the Ungava Bay coast of Nunavik, where they are known as ‘ikkariliit’ (a name that echoes the sound of the robin’s song). Robins generally migrate north along with average temperatures of 2.2 C. Thanks to warming temperatures in south Baffin, this means robins can […]