Ski Birding at Old Vermilion Trail

Year 5

Ski Birding: Webster’s dictionary does not define this phrase, but to readers of this blog the meaning should be obvious … taking one’s cross-country skis and heading out into the Boreal Forest while looking for birds. Since Monday, I have been ski birding four times. In fact, I maintain 5k+ of remote wilderness Nordic ski trails with three winter bird feeders at the trailhead. Snow has come to the Northwoods, and given firearms deer hunting season is now over, I have both groomed the trails and put up the winter feeders. (learn more / see map)

Yesterday morning, in addition to the usual suspects, I saw small flocks of Ruffed Grouse and Pine Grosbeaks near the feeders (200 yards). This Ruffed Grouse was “gritting up” after having eaten its breakfast.

You will find ski condition reports on SkinnySki under the heading of Old Vermilion Trail (NE Minnesota). This image is actually a GoPro shadow selfie photo taken last winter at a near by trail system, Boulder Nordic. Appropriately enough the trail I was skiing has the name Lonesome Grouse!

DCIM100GOPRO

A Snowy Owl Thanksgiving!

Year 5

After my early pre-dawn escapades trying to track my local Great Horned Owls, I decided to go Snowy hunting after the sun rose. I had heard an immature male was in the area, but my previous attempts to find the owl have been to no avail. Thankfully, this Thanksgiving morning, a dive bombing crow gave me directions to my friend.

Today’s clouds actually kept the Snowy Owl alert well past sunrise. As photographers the temptation is always to zoom in for the closest image, but I think I like some of the pics best that are backed off and show the environment.

Eventually my owl fell asleep. I definitely was NOT perceived as a threat! LOL.

Stalking Nemesis Two Hours Before Thanksgiving Sunrise

Year 5

The scene … the Northwoods of Minnesota … the edge of the Boreal forest … the sound of a waterfall … four inches of bright, fluffy new fallen snow.  Nemesis!

At 5:00 am as I lay half awake in bed I heard them hooting at me through the darkness. My local Great Horned Owls were playing with my brain. For two years I have tried unsuccessfully to find this love pair. They will serenade each other (and me) one to two hours before dawn. I have taken numerous hikes in the dark in futile attempts to find their daytime roosts … perhaps even their “love nest”, but alas to no avail.

Living next to Amity Creek (often flows like a river), the sound of the rapids and a waterfall reverberates in the ravine’s echo chamber 200 yards from my home which makes triangulating birds by sound difficult. However, this morning may have been different. I decided to get up and throw on warm clothes. The walk and driveway needed shoveling. By 5:15 am I was outside working. My Great Horned Owls had stopped hooting.  I imagine they were actually chuckling. They had lured my out of a warm bed next to my wife into the dark cold Minnesota night.

But wait … after shoveling the sidewalk, the hoots restarted. Leaving the uncleared driveway and my shovel behind I starting hiking though the inky blackness. Clouds meant it was pitch dark … no moonlight to guide me. However I caught a break; Amity Creek is now beneath a layer of winter ice. Even the sounds of the waterfall were muted under ice. Slowly I worked my way uphill, pausing every 100 yards to listen. Jackpot. I found the grove of majestic white pines where my friends were singing their night time chorus. If I am lucky, these trees are their daytime roost … might I even get lucky and find a nest in  February? (Great Horned Owls nest early in the year … thus their young hatch as new prey is birthed by small animals … an abundance of food for needy chicks).

I will return to the location after sunrise. The freshly fallen snow means I may be able to find owl pellets, or whitewash on tree trunks. My binoculars will be around my neck.

Nemesis … are you mine?

Here is the cousin of Nemesis … a Great Horned Owl I saw last February.