Snowy owl’s CT visits can endanger rare arctic bird
In 2017, an immature snowy owl perched on a pile of wood near my home. When I saw binocular-laden birders pull off on the shoulder of the road to catch a sighting — a rare gift from the arctic gods —Idid likewise.
A day or two later, the bird, flying low to the ground a snowy owls do, crossed the path of an oncoming truck. And that was how it met its end in the Nutmeg State.
This has been a noshow year for snowy owls in Connecticut. But every few years, the winter months are marked by snowys showing up along the coastline. In a big irruption year, they stop all over the state.
And, once here, they are put in constant danger — from vehicles, from airplanes, from crowding people.
“These are birds that have probably seen a polar bear before they've seen a car or a human,'' said Stefan Martin, conservation manager for the Connecticut Audubon Society.
In January, the society hosted a Zoom meeting with Rebecca McCabe, a research biologist at the Hawk Mountain Sanctuary in Pennsylvania and a member of Project SNOWStorm, a collaborative research effort to study snowy owls in winter, when the fly south from their home on the Canadian tundra.
.The project has a huge amount of things to learn about the arctic owls, McCabe said.
“It's a knowledge gap,'' she said.
What ornithologists now know is that the irruptions aren't caused by hard times up north, but rather, by very good times.
Snowy owls feed on lemmings. If it's a boom year for Arctic rodents, parent owls have lots of lemmings to feed their chicks. Those chicks grow up fat, healthy and many. When winter comes and competition for food gets more intense, the younger owls will fly south to hunt.
People have witnessed snowy owl irruptions since the 19th century. Thanks to the work Project SNOWstorm is doing, ornithologists are beginning to understand more about them.
The project is now learning that many snowy owls die in these irruptions, McCabe said. They get hit by vehicles, jet plane blasts kill them. They eat mice and rats laden with poison. People stress them out.
The majority of these deaths occur early in the winter, McCabe said. As the season progresses, the surviving visiting snowy owls learn to adapt to our cluttered environment.
There is also the problem of habitat.
Snowy owls are birds of the tundra – an open, flat, treeless landscape. When they fly down to civilizations, they find airfields fit that bill. At least 250 snowy owls have died in airfield collisions in recent years, McCabe said.
In an effort to save both owl and human lives, researchers are learning to capture snowy owls at airfields and relocate them away from danger, McCabe said. Because the owls can be territorial, ornithologists have learned to move them about 100 kilometers – about 60 miles – away if the relocations is to succeed,
she said.
Also, controlling human interactions require some basic education and common sense.
The state's barrier beaches are also treeless and tundra-like, said Ken Elkins, director of Connecticut Audubon Society's Coastal Center at Milford Point.
Working on the owls' favor, he said, is that in winter, fewer people are out birding, so there are fewer interactions.
“Some people always go out,'' he said. “The motto is ‘There is no bad weather. Only bad clothing'.''
But the thrill of seeing a rare beautiful wintery bird is not confined to “Harry Potter” fans.
“They are gorgeous,''
Martin said of the snowy owls. “They are the definition of awesome birds. I don't think there is anyone who wouldn't want to see a snowy owl.''
For that reason, naturalists are sometimes unwilling to let the general public know where the owls are perching.
“We like to keep it private,'' said Ryan MacLean, an educator at the Greenwich Audubon Center, a part of Audubon Connecticut.
The snowy owls visiting Connecticut are usually young birds that have never confronted humans, MacLean said.
“They are very easily stressed and harassed,'' he said. “They are very exposed.''
They are met by birders who want to get a really good look and photographers eager to get a really good shot – who are all well-meaning people who aren't always thinking what's best for the owls.
So as a general rule – for snowy owls, and for all owls – is to keep your distance. Depend on spotting scopes and telephoto lenses. Don't get up close and personal.
“100 yards is a good distance,'' said Stefan Martin of the Connecticut Audubon Society. “If it's alert and aware, you're too close.”