Sunday 22 January 2012

A Search for Owls (2)

Having found a Northern Hawk Owl on our last team outing, we decided this week to look for the two other owl species—Northern Pygmy-Owl and Great Gray Owl — often found in the Water Valley area NW of Calgary.

Mike, Ray and Phil set out before dawn in foggy conditions reminiscent of our journey from Halifax to Lunenburg two weeks earlier. The fog dissipated as we left the Bow Valley behind and our hopes were high, especially as Ray had seen some good birds on a solo outing two days earlier. Unfortunately birds were very few and far between. We saw no owls at all, and only 12 bird species in total, nothing new for the year. A lone Coyote seen by Grand Valley road as we returned to Calgary, a new mammal for our year list, prevented us from being completely shut out.

The very cold spell of last week is over, and we’ll look forward to birding in warmer conditions over the next few days.

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