Prowling for Owls at Klamath Marsh NWR

In February we headed south to Klamath Falls for our second annual trip to the Winter Wings Festival. We were looking forward to revisiting all the hotspots that had treated us so well on our last visit, but the main reason we wanted to get back was the overnight owl prowl we booked in hopes of finding a Great Gray Owl.

Black-crowned Night-Heron

Night-heron roost. There were dozens in just these couple of trees, and none anywhere else in town.

We met up with guides Harry and Kevin in the afternoon, along with our celebrity tagalong, James Currie. Currie was in town as the festival's keynote, but he was also filming an episode of his show Birding Adventures TV, with his trusty cameraman Jeff trying to capture footage of his "golden bird" (new episodes air on Destination America, but older episodes are available here).

James Currie

We would spend the night in a bungalow at the Klamath Marsh NWR headquarters. This was the same day the armed occupation of Malheur NWR finally ended, and we want to give credit here to USFWS who were prepared for the worst, not least because the refuge lies along one of the main routes to Burns, OR. By all accounts, the field trip was touch-and-go for a while, and you can bet that we would have been devastated had our plans been scuppered by a bunch of militant scumbags.

Our target: Great Gray Owl. This one was mounted in the building where we bunked for the night.

Spotted Owl wouldn't be a bad bird, either.

On our drive in to the refuge we had a steady stream of Rough-legged Hawks fly alongside the road, and perched in nearby trees. Later that night, this same road was where we'd flush half-a-dozen or more Short-eared Owls who were laying in wait for any voles foolish enough to leave snow tunnels.

Rough-legged Hawk

We haven't got any photos to share from our nocturnal prowlings, but the night started with a single toot from a Northern Pygmy-owl. A heard-only Northern Saw-whet Owl called much more persistently, but too far off to consider tracking down. And our target bird? Great Gray Owls make a repeating "woo, woo, woo" call… of which we heard only one "woo". A single woo, in fact, followed immediately by a Great Horned Owl. It all happened so fast, that we decided not to count it. When we finally do see/hear a Great Gray Owl, I want to FEEL that I was in the presence of greatness.

We were up well before dawn broke the next morning, hoping to turn up any last-minute owls while they were still active. A calling Pygmy-owl lured us into a meadow, leading to an exhausting quarter mile hike through foot-and-a-half-deep snow. We weren't able to pinpoint it, and settled for decent looks at a Clark's Nutcracker.

We didn't see any owls, but the sunrise alone was worth waking up for

On the way back into Klamath, we stopped at Collier State Park. We were all quite taken with an active pair of American Dippers that we'd missed when we checked in briefly the day before. They seemed right at home under the bridge, and someone said they saw a nest, but I don't think they ever visited it while we were there.

Williamson River runs through Collier State Park. That's the same Williamson as in Williamson's Sapsucker

Not sure what type of moth this is, but they were everywhere

American Dipper

Of course our attention broke away from the Dippers as soon as Harry called out a Northern Pygmy-owl he watched fly in across the stream. We'd already heard a couple call on this trip, but this was the first we'd seen. We were all impressed with how cooperative it was, unobstructed and out in the sunlight -- of course that was nothing compared with the one Maureen and I would find in Ashland three days later.

Northern Pygmy-owl - perhaps look for this future celebrity on a future episode of Birding Adventures?

The Pygmy-King of North Mountain

Last weekend we set out for an ambitious outing down near the Oregon/California border for our second annual trip to the Winter Wings Festival (a superb, excellently run small festival). Ordinarily we'd recount all our adventures chronologically, but on our fifth and final day we found a certain owl that's generated no small amount of interest, and I felt the need to write a timely account (at least compared with our usual leisurely blogging schedule).

Golden-crowned Sparrows

We spent Sunday night in Ashland with a few target birds in mind. Last year we found our lifer California Towhee at the Songer Wayside, along Emigrant Lake. We'd seen it for exactly as long as we needed to ID it, and not a split-second longer. We hoped we might have better luck this time, but an hour wading through the heavy fog turned up little more than Oak Titmice (Titmouses?) and Acorn Woodpeckers -- not that I'm complaining!

Foggy day at Songer Wayside

Oak Titmouse

But thank goodness we dipped on the towhee. We were ready with a back-up plan and headed for North Mountain Park, where they'd been reported in the past couple of days. We didn't expect much when we pulled in to a parking lot with a baseball diamond on one side, and a soccer field on the other. "This will be a quick stop," I thought. But the farther along the path we got, the more active it became. Through a scrubby thicket of buckbrush, I spotted a chunky bird that looked good for California Towhee. We tried entice it into the open, when a second towhee flew out in front of us, and then we got superb, unobstructed views of them both as they scratched around for worms. This would definitely be the bird of the day… for another five minutes.

California Towhee

Towhee butt

The path continued through an ethnobotanical garden, and I walked a few yards past Maureen as she paused to take photos of scouring rush. I noticed a good-sized fuzzball only 15 ft off to my side, in a tree inexplicably covered in white and pink ribbon. "What the hell?" I didn't even realize it was a bird at first. My brain slowly resolved the image, and I whistled back at Maureen to get her attention. I whispered, and mostly mouthed, "Pygmy-owl" just loudly to get the message back to her. She was skeptical, but gamely inched forward to where she could follow my eyes.

Northern Pygmy-owl

For a long, long time we watched the potato-sized owl take us in, along with the rest of its surroundings. Eventually it flew to another, farther part of the tree, but came back after a little while. It was definitely alert, and on the look-out. A pair of Lesser Goldfinches flew into a tree behind us, and the owl locked in immediately. Its body postured straight at them, with its head stretched up toward them. For a full minute, the owl readied itself for just the right moment, but when it finally moved in to strike, it missed its target by the slightest margin.

Pygmy-owl eyespots

Staying alert, looking for prey

Target acquired

Instead of flying off to safety, the goldfinches stood their ground and initiated their alarm call. In no time at all, they were joined by a Black-capped Chickadee, a Ruby-crowned Kinglet, and a Bushtit, and they jointly harassed the owl and made clear that they wouldn't look favorably upon further attempts to predate them. Whether the owl decided to take its frustration out on us, I don't know, but it flew close by us on the way back to its original perch, and we decided that would be a good time move along.

"Move along, buddy"

We left Ashland for Agate Lake, a bit farther north, hoping for Lewis's Woodpecker, which we'd dipped on earlier in the day. There wasn't a whole lot going on, other than an immature Bald Eagle perched just over the entrance. A good-sized flock of meadowlarks passed back and forth for a while, but not close enough for pictures. But our last stop before heading home was at Rogue Creamery to pick up some souvenir cheese. We were glad for the chance to appreciate Oregon's state bird and Oregon dairy all at once!

Juvenile Bald Eagle