All posts by richardhoeg@gmail.com

Doubles! Great Horned Owlets!

Year 6

Anyone remember the classic Doublemint Gum commercials? The gum’s slogan was: Double Your Pleasure. Double Your Fun! My morning followed the advertising jingle.

Arriving in the woods around 6:30 am I could not find any owls … parents or young in the nest or perched in the tree. However, a search of the surrounding forest finally yielded not one, but two owlets! My guess was the young owl I saw yesterday which had not yet fledged was being protected by the Mom,  Given all the crows in the area, now that both owlets have fledged, moving to a new tree was a good idea. Thus, I am proud to report that Les and Amy (Great Horned Owl parents) have not just one, but two young owlets.” I doubled my fun!” Enjoy …

Great Horned Twin #1

Great Horned Twin #2

The Siblings

Watching Out for those Pesky Crows

And the bookend to this post!

Lester Amity Great Horned Owl Family

Year 6,

All birding is special, but some days are MUCH more special.

Mr. and Mrs. Great Horned Owl would like to present “Junior” to the world. The happy couple started dating last Fall, and would often sing back and forth to each other … sometimes in my very own yard! Over the course of the winter the relationship grew stronger and the couple cemented the bond in early March!

This winter I often hiked or skied the area where I believed Les and Amy were hanging out. Occasionally I would get a quick glimpse of the owls at sunset. Yesterday evening at sunset I finally found “the tree”. The main clues were whitewash and feathers at the base of a white pine. A bit after sunrise this morning I found the nest. The names of these two parent owls are taken from the two rivers in the area … Les for the Lester River, and Amy for Amity Creek. I am thrilled! By yesterday evening given all my previous hikes (and skies) I was focusing my search upon an area 300×300 yards.

I have found and photographed other owls on their nests in my life, but I have such a personal connection with these birds. I can not begin to count how many times I heard this pair singing this winter … thus truly special for me. Obviously the owls knew I was visiting their section of the woods. Given all the crows and ravens in the area, the Mom does not stray far from Junior.

Mrs. Great Horned Owl (Amy) and Junior

Junior

Oh yes … I also found a Blackburnian Warbler in Hartley Park this morning. Normally, just finding and photographing this kind of warbler would make for a great day …

The Smelt are Running!

Year 6

We know! We know!

Find the fish which are spawning and you will find hungry birds. At sunrise (5:30 am) there were an amazing number of loons, cormorants, mergansers and gulls at the mouth of the Lester River on Lake Superior. By 6:00 am the show was over, but I just shifted my location and hiked out to the Superior Entry. In the distance via my binoculars I had spied hundred of terns feeding. I said to my self: “Self … more smelt!”

It took a three mile hike but once out to the Superior Entry these rather “uncommon” Common Mergansers put on quite the show for me. This couple was much more concerned about catching fish than worrying about a human. Please note I advanced on the mergansers from out of the sun, and then sat down on the sand. Eventually the birds made their way over to me. One needs to have patience to get photographs like these images, and also not be standing up. Birds immediately recognize you as “a human” when you are standing tall. I was less than ten yards from the mergansers.

Common Mergansers Fishing for Smelt

Permission to Surface, Captain?

Captain Merganser

Dive, Captain, Dive!