Just south of the true bog habitat … in the Meadowlands area there are farms up in Sax-Zim Bog. Yesterday afternoon I found two ring-necked pheasants, which are a bit unusual for our area, while looking for Snowy Owls.
Category Archives: Year 8
Snowy Owl on the Hunt!
- You hope auto-focus locks on the owl and not the trail grass
- You hope the owl’s eye becomes briefly viewable behind the grass
- You definitely take photos at 12 frames per second.
The hunt actually unfolded in this manner. The Snowy was perched far across a field on someone’s deer hunting shack. It obviously saw movement because the owl took flight and then quickly moved through a succession of tamarack trees that put the sun behind the attacking bird. It was nice to have the owl “move towards me” today.
I mentioned “a week of frustration”. Two nights ago just before sunset I watched two Snowy Owls perched within 150 yards of each other for over 80 minutes. Neither owl moved till after sunset, and even then the birds were not willing to pose with the gorgeous sunset behind them.
Snowy Arrives!
After many missed connections over the past few days across northeastern Minnesota, I found my first Snowy Owl up in Sax-Zim Bog this afternoon. This is the view I had for over 80 minutes, I hoped said bird would mover closer to me when it decided to hunt, but it actually moved almost a mile distant. Oh well … the first is always special.
There have quite a few Snowy Owls seen across Minnesota over the past few days. I think the HUGE winds including 50 mph wind gusts out of the NW blew all the owls down here a bit quicker. I am hoping we might have an irruption year, but it is definitely still to early to predict.