Snowy Owl/Tuscola Co

[Dmcwhir513 at aol.com]

Folks -

This morning, Alan Shlosberg and I made the trek north from Lansing to the 
flatlands in Tuscola County south of Saginaw Bay, seeking contact with any Snowy 
Owl(s) not found by us two weeks ago. We started in the vicinity of 
Akron/Bradleyville without immediate success. As we were heading back around going east 
on Elmwood, I noticed a halted vehicle down the road about 0.4 miles.  Hmm.

Put my bins up and saw what seemed to be a person swiveled in the drivers 
seat, leaning back, peering across the road. Aha!  A familiar pose, birder jizz 
for sure.

So, we traveled there and accosted Kim LeBlanc.  When I told him we were 
looking for Snowy Owls, he said he had seen three already this morning!!  An adult 
and two young birds!  He was scanning for one of the youngsters which had 
gone off a pole and flown into the field south of Elmwood.  After a bit more 
fruitless scanning, Kim kindly drove us down to where he had seen the adult 
earlier in the morning.

Snowy Owl has been near the top of Alan's "most wanted" for a long time, so 
he was keen with anticipation.  Each birder, no matter the experience or skill 
level, seems to have a mental list of such birds.  For whatever reason, and 
there are many, they really, really want to see those species.  I call these 
"Iconic Birds" because, in my mind, they represent something greater than the 
bird, the chase, or the sighting itself. They have become near mythic, slightly 
beyond real, feathered grails.

Of course, the owl was no longer there.

We thanked Kim for his time (We thank him again.) and admired his excellent 
photos of Snowy Owl and Merlin.  Secure in the knowledge there were owls to be 
seen in the vicinity, we resolved to search as long as it took ... and 
promptly found two birds in 15 minutes.

Both were on the ground, but they have been seen on telephone poles as well.  
They stuck out, even on a binocular scan, because they were taller than the 
false owls.  The adult was bright white, which helped, but the young bird fit 
right into the general scheme of things.

The adult was in a field SW of the corner of Bradleyville and Dutcher, about 
0.4 miles from the intersection along each road.  The young bird was in a 
field NE of Bradleyville and Akron, about 0.3 miles away from the intersection 
along each road, maybe a bit further from Bradleyville.

It was a good day.

Thanks also to the folks posting on the Saginaw Bay Area site.

http://www.saginawbaybirding.org/_winter07-08.htm


Take care.     - Doug


**************
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