Owl Quest – Again

I admit it – the birding gods have smiled on me when it comes to owl sightings.

I grew up in the northern boreal forest, where Great-gray and Great-horned owls were commonplace.  In a South Carolina cypress swamp, a Barred owl flew in and landed about 12 ft away. A few years ago, a Boreal owl choose the spruce trees in my yard to spend a month, much to the delight of every birder in the city. I’ve also had Long-eared and Saw-whet owls in the yard.

The nearby prairie grasslands have given me Burrowing, Short-eared and Snowy owls.  The first time we drove west of the city to find Northern Hawk owls, we saw four.

Extraordinarily lucky with owl sightings. With one exception.

For years, I have been trying to find a Northern Pygmy owl, or, as I’ve started calling them, Nemesis Pygmy owls. Each year, there are a few reports of sightings, and every time it happens, I head out and try it again. With no luck.

Last week the word went out – Northern Pygmy owl spotted in Fish Creek Park. I thought, oh hell, here we go again, but grabbed the binos and headed out anyway, as a birder must.

Fish Creek Provincial Park is Canada’s largest urban park, stretching over 14 km from east to west.  It covers a huge variety of habitat types, providing a cornucopia of birding experiences, with over 200 species recorded here. The eastern end is prairie grassland, the middle is aspen parkland, and the west end is pure boreal forest, with . The entire park protects the riverine habitat along Fish Creek, which eventually flows into the Bow River on the eastern edge.

On this day we were headed for the boreal forest, with mature white spruce, aspen poplar, paper birch and a host of other big trees hiding a little 6″ (14 cm) owl. Sigh.

Although the park literature says not to feed the wildlife, you really just have to pay a toll to get across the second bridge. The Black-capped chickadees, never shy in the first place, absolutely demand seeds or nuts here. The small group at this location must be the most well fed black-capped chickadees in Canada. They were literally buzzing around my husband before he could even get the nuts out of his pocket.

Toll paid, we crossed the bridge and went deeper into the park. The other side of the bridge was alive with Boreal chickadees, who could have cared less about the human interlopers. We were accompanied by the ever-present Black-billed magpies and a Raven. But no owl.

I decided it (again) wasn’t my day to see a Northern Pygmy owl so we retraced our steps. Just as we got back to the Boreal chickadee end of the bridge, I heard an owl call.

I looked up to the top of the 30 ft spruce tree right in front of me and HEY – a Northern Pygmy owl, sitting up there in the sunshine. WhooHoo! I did my little birding happy dance that spontaneously erupts when I get a life bird, then settled down to watch my prize.

We watched this little guy for about 10 minutes, and then he flew into some thick brush, and out of sight. I happy-danced all the way back to the parking lot, and just as we got there, a Great-horned owl flew low over our heads. I couldn’t shake the feeling he was giving me his blessing, or congratulations, or something. Spooky.

The birding gods have been truly generous with me. Will they remain so kind when I’m searching for other owls, or have I used up all my owl luck? With or without their help, I have to continue my owl quest, as I’m intending to see every owl species in North America. I just hope they don’t forget I exist when I start looking for Spotted owls – some form of divine intervention will surely be required for that one.