Evening flight
I found a Swainson’s hawk south of Cochrane last week. When the bird eventually pushed off from this tangle of branches I took a couple of photographs with the wings at full extension.
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A sunny snowy morning
Snowy owls have been a focus of mine this winter. Last Saturday I was east of Calgary again – touring the back roads, looking for owls and, when they were found, working to not spook them. A few of my earlier visits to the prairies have been frigid experiences. That day was pleasantly different – the sun cut through the clouds early and they moved on altogether by mid-morning but did so without a heavy wind pushing them. The relatively mild and calm weather was welcome indeed.
The day was productive in every sense. I found two owls just after daybreak near Gleichen. I spotted the first one as she flew parallel to the road I was traveling down. The second was perched on this fence line but he took off as the first neared. The displacer landed and fussed with her feathers while scanning the ground. The sun lit her up a couple of times which was special. She eventually glided over the fields behind her and landed on a rise after catching an unlucky creature for breakfast. I drove below the rise and caught her yawning before she rested and dozed for a bit.
Note: this snowy is mottled with dark and light feathering and that used to be thought to be exclusively females and the almost pure white owls were males. Over the last few years, that has been disproven (some females are all white and some males are not). There is no visible way to confirm the sex that I am aware of so I still refer to a white one as “he” and the others as “she”. That is a bit of anthropomorphization but I really dislike calling animals “it”.
I had an encounter with a beautiful almost solid white snowy owl an hour later a little further north of this spot. I will share that story with him soon!
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A gallery of Great gray owls
(Please click on either image to open the Great gray owl gallery)
It has been a while since I put together a gallery of animal images so I worked on one last night. I chose Great gray owls as they are among my very favourite birds to watch and to photograph. They have a balance of power and intelligence that always impresses me. All of these images are from the Bragg Creek area, either in West Bragg or on the edge of Kananaskis that shares a border with it. I have been photographing some of these owls for six years or more although most of the early images didn’t make this cut for various user operator (me!) issues. For the 35 images that did, it was fun to look at the scenes I’ve been able to see them hunt, perch and fly in.
Looking back over these I feel very fortunate to be able to have spent so much time with these beautiful raptors. At some times of the year, I see them rarely but I enjoy knowing that they are still there. When are paths do cross, it never fails to be a continuation of my education about Great grays. I still have a lot to learn… lucky me!
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An evening in the forest
The owls have been spoiling me over the past couple of weeks so please forgive yet another Great gray post with images from these most wonderful birds!
I found this owl hunting deeper in the forest and then worked the fence line on either side of the gravel road I was on in West Bragg. After a mouse there, it moved out of the shadows and into the late day sunlight filtering through the forest. These photographs cover that time where he flew between trees and dove into a couple of grassy spots. All the effort yielded two more field mice and some great opportunities for me. After another hour passed, he flew towards a field as the sun dipped behind the hills across the valley and I headed home.
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Snowy owls aloft in the blue sky
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Rough-legged hawks and the advancing spring
Through the winter, Rough-legged Hawks, as with the adult above and the juvenile below, keep watch over the Prairies. These hawks are equipped for the cold temperatures and many choose to skip the migration and over winter here. As the weather warms, their cousins, the Red-tailed, Sharp-shinned, Cooper’s and Broad-winged Hawks are starting to return.
One of the great joys of spring for me is the return of these hawks to the fields and grasslands. However with a few great encounters with the Rough-legged hawks shown here, I’m not in any particular rush.
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The robins have been coming home for the last couple of weeks and a flight of about thirty Dark-eyed Juncos swarmed our backyard a couple of days ago. So, spring seems close at hand. I’m looking forward to more time with all the different hawks that spend their summers raising chicks here.
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Eagles along the Grand Valley Road
Our family went for a drive along the Grand Valley Road northwest of Cochrane a few days ago in search of raptors of any description. This road is nice drive that is rarely busy and can often yield sightings of owls, hawks or eagles. In a hilly farmland area we noticed a number of ravens circling around a stand of trees in a field a couple of hundred metres off the road. When we pulled over to see what the focus of their attention was two coyotes bolted out from under a large cedar and sprinted across the open into the thicker forest on the far side of the field. Looking back to the spot where they started running we could see a carcass that had been mostly picked clean of what, judging by one of the horns that was sticking up, appeared to be a bison. As it was on farm land it seems likely there were bison being raised here but there were no other farm animals within sight to confirm that theory. With coyotes, ravens, magpies and probably a number of other predators drawn to this unfortunate beast, its herd was likely as far away from this spot as the fences would allow. So, we were watching the ravens which were squawking and pestering the smaller birds picking at the scraps when Bobbi noticed a Golden eagle (Aquila chrysaetos) approaching from down the valley.
We already had the long lenses out so we were able to photograph the bird as it flew overhead towards the other birds. Two ravens also saw the eagle inbound and flew up to harass this new attendee. The three looped around the trees for a minute before the eagle landed in one of the high branches and the black birds returned to ground.
During this chase, the overcast skies took on a more threatening tone and soon a soft snowfall turned into a blizzard. I thought the Golden eagle would wait out the height of the storm from the perch so I kept looking around to see if the coyotes, or anything else, came back.
Out of the sheets of snow a Bald eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) swooped in and took up a spot on a tree near to the Golden. This had turned out to be a great encounter and when a couple more Bald eagles flew in and around over the next half an hour, it continued to get better and better. The snow did finally ease up and there were opportunities for nice flight images.
The lighter skies appeared to spur one of the Bald eagles to say goodbye to a raven it had been sharing a tree with across the field and glide over to the bison skeleton.
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This eagle brought a good amount of conviction to its scavenging intent and it chased off all of the passerine that had been crowding on the ground.
When we moved on, this eagle was alone on the ground having successfully landed and taken ownership of what remained.
The Golden eagle had disappeared and two Bald eagles were perched where they could keep an eye on the bones. The collection of black birds were scattered in singles and small groups around the scene though none strayed close to the eagle holding dominion on the ground. The last wildlife we saw as we drove away were the coyotes trotting along the hill towards the farm-house keeping their distance while still keeping an eye on the bison.
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Rough-legged Hawks – they are everywhere…
… And that is a great thing. Everywhere may be an exaggeration but if you drive along the range roads west of Calgary or hike along the edges of the fields around the Springbank and Bragg Creek areas, you are very likely to spy one of these beautiful birds perched on a treetop or telephone pole. If you are lucky, or have the time to wait, you can see them gliding over grassy areas searching for the small creatures that they prefer to dine on. In my wildlife searches this winter, I have enjoyed seeing many of these hawks.
Above and below a Rough-legged is on the hunt in West Bragg Creek.
(please click on any image if you want to open a new page with a higher resolution version)
Below, a couple of hawks working the fields around the Springbank Airport came close enough and stayed around long enough for me to photograph.
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Great Gray Owl flights and perches in Bragg Creek
I had a great morning earlier this week watching this female Great Gray Owl. She flew to several perches as she moved from the forest into the open meadows nearby.
She was watching for quite a while at each stop. She seemed pretty relaxed, without any great urgency to hunt.
Down the field, the sun was reaching into the trees. The light that got through was really beautiful.
I’m hoping to hang out again over the weekend. We’ll see if she is thinking the same thing.
Christopher Martin Photography 