Late Winter Owls

It has been relatively quiet around Peace country the last little while. I haven't been out looking for Snowy Owls for almost 2 weeks, last time I was out I found 2 new owls in areas I haven't searched before and I was lucky to find these two young males. The first male was light, 1310 grms

where the second male was in great shape at 1700 grms.

Most of all the hawkowls have moved on, I still have 2 hawkowls that are sitting exactly where i caught them around christmas time but I found 2 new ones, the first one pictured here came in without even using a live mouse, I had a frozen vole in my car and as soon as it hit the ground this bird came in right away, the other hawkowl I caught that day was far out in a field hunting, so I played the call and it came in with a flock of redpolls in pursuit, as i held the hawkowl the redpolls would flutter beside my hand, i've never witnessed that before!

Last night I was thinking why not try for Boreal Owls just to see if anything was floating around, the night was perfect at -10 C and no wind with clear skies. I setup one mist net under a stand of White Spruce trees that were 60+ feet tall to block out the moonlight right beside Leddy Lake which is 15 mins north of Peace River. First net check produced this SY BOOW.

I left the BOOW call on for another hour with no more birds caught so I decided to switch the call to Saw-whets and the next net check produced 2 Saw-whets, both SY birds which I thought was very strange. Either these birds have stayed up here all winter or else they are coming through now which to me would seem early. The molt of all three of these birds were even right across the wing so i'm thinking young from last summer.

Few More Owls

Jan.22/12

Went out today to see if there were any new Owls around, did a tour through my northern route to search for Great Grays and Hawkowls, I couldn't find any Great Grays, they seem to be extremely scarce this winter. I did find this juvy Northern Shrike.

Found a Northern Hawk Owl close to Peace River, turned out to be a SY bird with an unusual old wing injury.

Close up

Most of the Snowy Owls have moved out of Peace Region, my guess is maybe to Grande Prairie area or even further south, totals now are 36 SNOW's banded and 4 retraps of my own birds. Here's a couple of new ones.

An ASY Male SNOW

An SY female

This has been an incredible winter, lets hope it continues!

2012 Year of the Snowy Owl

Jan.3rd 2012

Since last post i've been able to capture and band alot more Snowy Owls around Peace Country. Totals to date are 28 newly banded Snowies and 3 retraps from birds I banded a few weeks ago. I caught a HY(hatch year Male) from Dec.18 which is now a SY(second year) bird with the turning of the calendar year, it was retrapped 17 kms further south so these owls are still on the move if they haven't found a decent spot to maintain territory which is typical with young male Snowy Owls. The other was one I caught yesterday which was retrapped 2 kms east of its original banding location and after I investigated its old site I could clearly tell why, there were 2 large females hunting his old territory so they kicked him out which is also typical with females being more aggressive for territory.

HY Male

Here is a large female where he was banded back in December.

The majority of Snowies that have been banded have been HY females, here is one from a couple of weeks ago.

Most of these owls are in decent condition but I have come across 2 that I was concerned about. I have been feeding them voles that I have trapped just to give them some needed energy.

I'm hoping to band as many Snowies as possible before they depart Peace Region in March or April so that next winter i'll hear about one of these owls turning up somewhere else in the country or if I get lucky and retrap one of my own birds to determine whether or not they do come back to this place.

Snowy Madness

Dec.4th 2011

With having my weekends off and reports of Snowy Owls around Peace River i've been lucky enough to head out and catch 6 Snowy Owls so far. I received word from the local Fish & Wildlife Dept that there were a couple snowies hanging around the bridge. I was fortunate to catch 2 of them, one being an adult female and she was the most miserable owl thats i've ever handled. The other was a hatch year male that was on the light side but with the amount of voles and mice around the bridge shouldn't have much trouble catching food, my only concern was that one if not both of these owls will become roadkill. Only time will tell.

I went looking around last week and found this massive adult female and she came in within 2 mins, usually I would have to wait anywhere from 20mins to 2 hrs before they come in. This bird was a healthy 2100 grms!

Yesterday evening I was out looking around because as many people know with the amount of Ravens around these Snowies won't sit up high to hunt until it gets almost dark so they aren't harassed, I found two young snowies and caught both, these birds are showing up hungry but not in that bad of shape as everyone is predicting.

I hope my luck continues, this is so far my best Snowy Owl capture season since 2005.

First Alberta Fall

Nov.14th 2011

Raptors have been plentiful this fall around Peace River. I have officially moved up here from Saskatoon and getting out to band birds is alot more difficult with a full-time job.

Rough-legged Hawks have been coming through in October and some days I counted 10-20 birds hunting in the same field! They were extremely hard to trap this fall i'm speculating because of the amount of mice and voles in the field but whenever I tried to trap one they would ignore my efforts. I was lucky enough to trap a dark RLHA back at the end of October. I'm guessing it came in as fast as it did because it was starving, it was an adult male and it was very thin weighing in at 820 grms!

There were a number of Harlan's Hawks coming through and I was able to catch an adult male. I had a number of juvy Harlan's stuck on my trap but wasn't able to secure them and they flew away.

Here is a picture of a Northern Hawk Owl that I banded a couple of days ago.

I was out looking for Snowy Owls south of Peace River yesterday. I've only come across 2 SNOW's and haven't been able to catch any but I did manage to catch 2 more Rough-legged Hawks. Here's one of them. A nice HY female but a little on the thin side at 928 grms.

Boreal Surprise

Sept.15th 2011

I have been patiently waiting for my Alberta banding permit to arrive and it did this week, so I headed out NW of Manning close to where our tanker base is. I drove along a gravel road, past a sign saying "Your in Grizzly Country" and thought to myself O God please keep me safe. A few of my co-workers wanted to see how I go about trapping owls. We found a great spot in prime Boreal Forest, mostly in White Spruce mixed with some Trembling Aspen.

First net check we found this SY (Second Year) Northern Saw-whet Owl in the net.

After taking all her measurements and a couple quick photos she was released. We could hear a couple owls calling close to the net so after 20 mins we went back to check the net and this HY (Hatch Year) Boreal Owl was in the net.

After the Boreal was released it began to rain so we closed up for the night. What a fantastic first night!

Mike Blom
Peace River, AB

Fall Migration Begins

Sept 1st 2011

Had a few days off for my younger sister's wedding so Michelle and I left Peace River headed for Saskatoon. I checked out Hawk Ridge banding site in Duluth Minnesota and they had an impressive 400+ Sharp-shinned Hawks fly through there site yesterday.

I was hoping for some birds to start coming through Petrofka Raptor Station and was not dissapointed! In 2 days of trapping migrating raptors I caught 5 birds! I know this isn't alot for people along the great lakes where trapping 100 sharpies in a single day isn't unheard of, but here in the prairies its not a bad couple of days. I caught 2 Hatch year American Kestrels and a Hatch year Sharpie.

HY SSHA

Today began nicely when this Merlin came out of nowhere and buried itself in the net.

Not even an hour later and this HY SSHA was caught, didn't even see it come in. Too bad I didn't have a station setup along the Peace River, last week I had an adult Peregrine Falcon fly over!

Hatch year Sharp-shinned Hawk