Owls - Hoot of a day

The beauty of being retired is that any day of the week can be a "Saturday" where I can just spend the full day "out and about."  Yesterday was such a day and I ended up photographing four species of owls and a lot of other wild things.

None of the owls were new discoveries as I knew where they were; I just had to be lucky and they needed to cooperate.  The Saw-whet owls are using the nest boxes already and I have been watching this one for about a month.  It was peeking out of the hole as I arrived early in the morning. 

 

After visiting a pair of Great-horned owls, I checked it again and it was about half way out of the nest box and still ignoring me

 

Then I walked down to the East Windrow at Market Lake and the Long-eared owls were out of their normal hiding places.  With the sun just coming through the thin clouds, they were easy to photograph.  At best count, all seven of them were still there.

 

The sizes between them are very different.  There was also a Great-horned owl in the same windrow.

 

After spending the day playing with other wildlife like elk, deer, coyotes, jackrabbits, waterfowl and even doing a few chores, I went to Camas NWR to watch the eagles and check on the Short-eared owls.  I found nine Short-ears working the grasslands around the empty ponds.  I hid in some reeds the owls were working.  This one about landed on me.

 

I was delighted to watch them display and even watched as one harvested a rodent.

 

After the sun went down, I located this beautifully colored Great-horned owl in some old dead cottonwoods.

 

I checked several areas to see if the Burrowing owls had showed up, but I was a few weeks too early.  But it was just another early morning and late evening spent with the wild creatures of Idaho.

Spring has Sprung

With the warm February that we have had here in Idaho, the animals and birds are starting the migration and dating early.  Yesterday was very overcast, but I still went looking for action.  Too early for a good picture, I caught these two Golden eagles dating.

Then in mixed flocks of waterfowl, I found these two Canada's playing "wings" as they kept flirting with each other.

 

The flocks of waterfowl were joined by the first flight of Snow and Ross's geese that are about two weeks early from their normal migration here.

 

About 130 snows joined other waterfowl to eat the leftovers from the digestive process of a herd of bison west of Market Lake.

 

There were seven pair of Northern Harriers doing their mating flights over the still frozen ponds of Market Lake.  Here I caught a female harassing seven Long-eared owls in a windrow of thick brush.

 

It appears that six of the seven owls have chosen their partners for the nesting season while one needs a dating service to find someone before Valentine's Day.

Its beginning to look like a love fest has started in the wilds of Idaho.  May Cupid smile down on you during this time of new beginnings.

Beauty in a Frosty week

"What a dreary day," commented a person I was talking to.  With heavy fog and frost covering everything, from the inside of buildings it may look dark and dreary; but from the outside it is really alive and beautiful.  All wildlife needs to eat to survive as they do not have a fast food joint to stop by to pick something up.

This muskrat and several others were pulling water plants to fill its daily needs

 

Here a Sharp-shinned hawk wait patiently for a hapless bird to come along.

 

A natural flocked fir tree shows which direction the breeze is blowing as it stacks up the frost crystals on the needles and cones.

 

A beautiful Sharp-tailed grouse has been picking up gravel and grain from the side of plowed roads but runs to safety in a snow covered field.

 

A Red-shafted Northern flicker appears to be shivering in a tree where a breezy has removed most of the frost.

 

A beautiful Long-eared owl looks through a frost-laden tree waiting for darkness to gather its supper. 

 

An Evening Grosbeak brings a lot of color to my backyard as he comes in to feed on the sunflower seeds.

 

And this pheasant hen is far from where she should be.  She and her friend, another hen, were found roaming the banks of the Henrys Fork of the Snake River between St. Anthony and Ashton.

 

"Beauty is in the eye of the beholder," and sometimes you must leave the confines of buildings to see it.  Just a couple of days in the wilds of Idaho during a "dark and dreary" week.  Thanks, God, for sending all this beauty for us to enjoy.

Whitetails, coyotes and fun

I spent most of Monday and today in the wilds of Idaho, mostly near Camas NWR, Market Lake and areas between.

Monday morning I watched a White-tailed buck chasing a doe out near a patch of high sage brush, so being the sneaky fellow that I am, I decided to surprise them.  That I did.

The buck jumped out of the sagebrush, then he started chasing the doe.  For safety or for something that has a greater pull than safety.

 

I flushed a Northern Harrier on the way back to the truck.

 

The rest of the day was hiking about seven miles with very little excitement until the evening when I flushed a Long-eared owl with very poor light which equals poor pictures.

This morning I was on the desert long before the sun rose in the east.  Jackrabbits were all over the place, but no Golden eagles to chase them close to me.

 

The White-tailed deer appeared to be thicker than the jack rabbits.

 

I watched 14 bull elk about a mile away from me, but as I dropped over a ridge, nine White-tailed  were working a far ridge and were more concerned what was in the tall grass than they were of me.

 

Four coyotes were spread out through the marsh hunting.  It appeared two adults were teaching two pups how to hunt.

 

The coyotes flushed as Snowshoe hare out of the marsh grass and it ran right between two deer that were more concerned about the coyotes than they were of me.

 

I followed the deer over the hill and then I had a card in my camera malfunction.  I thought I was still shooting pictures of five bucks chasing a doe in heat, but nothing was recorded.  I am heading back on Friday to try to get those bucks sparring and fighting; but it was an experience of a lifetime that was missed.

 

After I realized the card had gone baaaaaad, I headed home and replaced the card.  To make sure it was working, I headed for the river bottoms and ran into this beautiful Saw Whet owl.  I ran back and got my wife and grandchildren to see it.  A rare find to be sure.  I will take Lady Luck anytime.

 

Just a couple of days in the wilds of Idaho for a wild retired old bald man.

R and R with the birds

After a hard week dealing with Homecoming at school and in charge of a seminar for the Teaching American History Grant all day Satureday (it was outstanding with Peter Henriques, author of Realistic Visionary, discussing George Washington), I needed some R and R.  So out to Market Lake to look for migrating birds I went.

Immature Swainson's hawks were everywhere looking for food.  Here is one that was harassing a bunch of sparrows in a thicket.

Flocks of Canada geese were in stubble fields and ponds alike.

                               

Then I got to the thickets that housed the Great-horned owls.

In the next line of brush, I saw 9 Long-eared owls.

Then on the way home I caught this Swainson's having dinner.

Probably a nest-mate of it come in to try to steal a snack before it was gone.

I loved the R and R enjoying the down time with the birds of the area.  Just the end of another wild week in Idaho.

Snow, Snow, snow

Three days of snow slowed the birding during my Spring break, but did not stop it.  I encountered some old and new birds.

Between snow storms I located the Long-eared owl nest without disturbing the female.

While the male circled and kept an eye on me.

The snow started to fall on Thursday after I left the owls and the sandhill cranes, teal and coots did not seem to mind.

But then on Friday, the ground was covered and I slipped out at 5 a.m. to see if I could find my first Sage grouse of the season.  I found them on a lek, but only seven males and no females showed up.  I was able to get a few pictures, but they did not stay long as they preferred the sage rather than the bare snow covered breeding ground with no breeding to be done.

                                      

With snow showers and wind up to 40 mph, the ice on Mud Lake started to break up exposing winter-killed fish.  On the edge of the ice 54 eagles, mostly immature Balds, gathered to feed.  That evening, I hid in some large cottonwood trees and photographed the eagles coming into roost.  The grey skies did not make for great shots, but it was exciting to watch these birds fight the wind to find their roost for the night.

                                     

Even in the snow, it was a great way to spend two days in the wildness of Idaho.  Happy Easter.

I'm Back

After a week of traveling, a severe cold, a three-day conference, I will post a few of the pictures I lucked into. 

Here are two flickers of a group of 18 fight over some rotten apples under an old apple tree.

Here is a mostly red-shafted Northern Flicker with some yellow-shafted feathers in its tail and it also had four in the left wing.

I was also able to visit the group of Long-eared owls and found three pairs of the 12 still there and setting up home by working on nests.  We will see what happens.

They were also a little more available for roosting pictures.

Just some more wild days in Idaho.

Desert sunset - SkyWatch Friday

Tuesday evening as I was coming back from observing the Long-eared owls, the thin clouds created a beautiful sunset across the Big Desert west of Rexburg.  It was beautiful in my rear view mirror.

Earlier in the late afternoon, I caught this Long-eared owl coming into a tree to roost.

And then just as I was leaving the 11 Long-eared, I found this one hiding next to a tree trunk.

A great day to spend the evening celebrating another wild day in Idaho.

View other great SkyWatch Friday pictures at http://skyley.blogspot.com/