It was a very cold clear winter evening. The snow was very crunchy and there was no wind. I believe I was in 2nd year university, so around 21 yrs old and probably 1975. I was out cross country skiing with my mother on her 100 acre farm near Elora Ontario. We were skiing towards the back of the farm thru the open field with our two dogs. It was full dark, but probably not much later than nine or so as my mom went to bed fairly early. About 3/4 of the way back there was a fence that ran at right angles to our direction. A single row of 20 year old or so trees and bushes grew along this fence. Our attention was at first drawn to flickering light in these trees. We thought it might be hunters with flashlights out raccoon hunting and were immediately concerned as our dogs had run on ahead. As we got closer we saw a round light float up just above this single row of trees and seem to bob along parallel to the fence for a ways before sinking slowly back down to almost ground level. Probably around 30 feet rise / fall. We soon realized that what we thought was flashlights was actually a number of round orbs in amongst the trees. Some either on or near the ground, some three or so feet up, and some higher in the trees. They all moved slowly, with slight bobbing motions. It was difficult to estimate how many there were, but our best guess was around twenty. All of the trees were bare, and the lights thru the branches created weird moving shadows on the snow. As we got closer we called for the dogs, as we didn't know what we were looking at. I had never heard of orbs, nor do I think anyone was reporting seeing them back then. Honestly I can't remember what the reaction of the dogs was - whether they were barking at, ignoring, or exhibiting any other odd behaviour towards the orbs. We got within 20 yards of the fence. The objects seemed totally oblivious to us. They kept on gently rising up, sinking down, bobbing along just above the tree tops or amongst the branches, and just sitting at various heights. The light they gave off was very bright - almost as bright as a full moon on a clear winter night. It was obvious that the orbs were intelligently controlled as they managed to avoid all contact with the tree branches and each other. I would estimate that they were within an area of a couple of hundred feet along the fence line. None ever came closer to us or seemed to stray too far back from this thin tree line. The field beyond was clearly visible thru the fence / trees. Two orbs started to rise faster than usual from opposite ends of the fence line. As they passed tree height they suddenly accelerated to a tremendous rate of speed on what looked like a collision course. From our perspective it looked like they barely missed each other. Where their paths crossed the light momentarily flashed much brighter than just double the light. They continued on their individual trajectories until they disappeared from view. The remainder of the orbs continued to float about. It almost seemed like a ballet with two or three coming close together and then floating apart, others circling each other, etc... Very elegant and controlled. Beautiful to watch. Nothing like balloons caught in the branches. Slow, deliberate movement both horizontal and vertical. Individual orbs would cover the whole 200 feet horizontally and then return to their starting point. We eventually decided that they must be some type of ufos, but they were all around two to three feet in diameter ( as best as we could tell based on the fence height ), and not the flying discs that we had read about. How could there be anyone / anything small enough to pilot them? Although my mother and I didn't find the orbs themselves scary, I had read one of the classic ufo books, which talked about flying saucers sucking up animals and taking off. I became concerned that our two dogs were going to be carried off. Looking back, how these 3 foot balls were going to lift an Irish setter and a yellow lab I don't know. Silly. In total, we watched for around 10 minutes. Occasionally another orb would rise up and quickly disappear. Quickly as in so fast that they created a continuous blur of light. I don't remember any of these high fliers returning. As we made our way back to the farmhouse we could still see the orbs floating about ( the orbs were behind us ). The dogs must have followed without a fuss or I would remember that. Once back in the house it sort of sunk in. We weren't freaked out as much as intrigued. Odd I know. We often talked about how oddly calm we were. We were freezing cold, and not willing to put our skis back on and retrace our steps. Since our farm is on the corner of two roads, we decided to get in our car and see if we could get back close to the location. Unfortunately the sideroad had not been plowed more than a hundred feet or so past the intersection. We never saw the orbs again. We told the immediate family about what we'd seen over the next few days. None were particularly interested. Over the years I've told a few friends, but beyond that nothing. My mother died at 91 last spring. We compared notes about what we remembered sometime during her last year. Our memories matched almost identically except for one odd point. She remembered the orbs as giving off red light and I remembered the orbs as giving off pure white light. It's probably possible to tie down exactly when this happened. Later that same week the Guelph newspaper had a picture of what was supposed to have been the clearest ufo picture to date. Shot locally. As I remember the picture, it was of a classic saucer shaped craft - not matching at all what we had seen. The coincidence is what stuck with me. Thanks to John Hayes at UFOINFO for letting us know about this event and connecting us up with the witness who submitted the report.