Migration patterns Canada and US

When I first started tracking distant cousins particularly from the county of Norfolk in England who migrated to Canada many only stayed one generation before heading to the US. Having recently taken a closer look at the Canada 1881 census which you can enter at Lost Cousins I found a contingent of "Pennsylvania Dutch" who migrated up through Canada c 1861- 1881 and settled there. Some of this particular group in my case settled around the north shores of Lake Ontario for several generations before moving c 1901-1921 towards Canada's west coast where they still live.
It was looking at religious affiliation as well as occupation that prompted me to dig deeper. I think it was likely that ties to Mennonite and Free Methodist communities that drew my in-law connections north as much as the opportunity to "homestead".

 

Ontario GenWeb has some good resources on emigration to Canada from around the world. On a local level you will find lots more in provincial, county and municipal archives.

 

I found the best information in the end from a Mennonite source and discovered the family I was tracing were among the first "inland" white settlers in Southern Ontario around 1820.