Long-eared owl

Burlington, ON. February 20 2020. I solicited a couple of friends to come out with me for a walk, we needed and welcomed the exercise. It was cold though not too cold, but still the kind of day when you like to get out of the wind. We hiked a valley edge and found just five bird species: first a group of three Red-tailed Hawks circling or maybe being blown over the nearby fields, a sleek, too-fast-for-us, mystery raptor maybe or maybe not a Merlin, a couple of Black-capped Chickadees, two probable Northern Cardinals and, Bird of the Day, a Long-eared Owl!

Our walk took us by plantations of mixed-age Norway Spruces and White Pines and the combination of open fields and the shelter afforded by the dense conifers is just the sort of place where owls like to hang out by day. We threaded our way carefully between sheltering clusters in hope that we might happen upon a Saw-whet Owl. There was some evidence of owls: the piled feathers and legs of a Mourning Dove under one pine and owl poop scattered on the branches of a dense spruce.  It was of course a Long-eared Owl that made the day.

It was well worth celebrating. It was a lifer for Alex and I couldn’t remember when I’d last seen one in the wild; maybe thirty years ago (?) Here it is.