Great Gray Owls--Ghosts of the North

One of the great things about winter birding is that every year is different and you never quite know how far south different species of birds will travel in search of food. Summer species are mostly predictable, as species typically return to the same nesting habitat each year since each species has fairly specific requirements for nesting. Finding a good place to nest requires the right type of vegetation, a good source of high-protein food for nestlings, and protection from predators. But in winter each species is only focused on one thing--finding enough food to survive the winter so that it can breed again next year. The availability of food changes each winter based on the cycles of temperature and precipitation, and thus determines how far a bird may have to migrate to find these food sources. Most of our insectivorous species have to travel to tropical climates where insects are available year-round, but frugivores (fruit-eating birds), granivores (seed-eating birds), carnivores, and omnivores can usually find year-round food sources in or near their breeding habitat and won't migrate south unless conditions such as drought or extreme cold diminish their food sources. When food becomes scarce non-migratory species will slowly move their range south in search of a reliable food source. For some species, such as Redpolls, this happens regularly, on a fairly predictable 2-3 year cycle, but for other species the cycles are much less predictable, and may only happen every 5-10 years. One such species is the Great Gray Owl, which relies mostly on voles and other small rodents to get through the winter. Rodents are prolific breeders, so they tend to be abundant year-round, but occasionally the lack of food will cause rodent populations to crash, forcing the Great Gray Owl out of its northern boreal forest habitat and into areas where rodents are still abundant. Surprisingly one of the best places for an owl to find a good supply of rodents this time of year is the bustling metropolis of Montreal.

A Great Gray Owl, photo from owling.com

About a month ago reports of Great Gray Owls throughout Quebec started appearing on birding list-serves, mostly from urban parks that are in and around Montreal. Great Gray Owls need open fields to hunt, and mature trees to hunt from, which many of Montreal's parks provide. The last Great Gray Owl invasion was eight years ago, in 2005, when there were dozens of them across the city. The greatest concentration of them was on Ile Bizard, an island on the northwest side of Montreal, that has a large nature park surrounded by suburban housing--perfect rodent habitat. In 2005 I had just moved to Plattsburgh, only an hour from Montreal, and so I made the trip up there to see the owl invasion. It was an incredible experience, Great Gray Owls seemed to be everywhere, I saw at least half a dozen that day. Even more amazing was how close you could get to them, you could practically walk right underneath them and they still wouldn't leave their perch. Being such a large bird, 70-80cm in length and a wingspan up to 152cm, they don't take flight unless absolutely necessary due to the energy involved, so they just stay perched most of the day. Since they aren't hunted and have few natural predators they don't seem to feel threatened by humans, they simply stare at you as you walk by with their gorgeous yellow eyes. Then they look quickly look away and return to what they were doing before you disturbed them--using their incredible senses to listen for food. Though owls have excellent eyesight it is near impossible to spot a rodent in snow-covered fields so they rely on sound instead to find rodents burrowing beneath the snow.The disk-like appearance of a Great-Gray Owls face serves a purpose--the arrangement of the feathers funnels sound into the owl's ears, making its hearing keen enough to hear a vole tunneling beneath a foot of snow. When they hear a vole they take to the air with very slow stiff wingbeats and then glide silently over the field so that they can use their ears to pinpoint the vole's exact location before it plunges into the snow to capture its prey. Their silent flight has earned them the nickname "Ghost Owl", because they glide like a ghost over the field, undetectable by their prey.

The Great Gray Owl near Cap St Jacques, Montreal.
 Photo by Eric D'Amour

Such a cool creature is certainly worth making a second trip to Montreal to see, eight years later, so this past weekend I assembled a car full of birders to ride with me across the border in search of one of these amazing birds, two of which had never seen a Great Gray Owl before. Any trip to Quebec is quite the adventure, as navigating the streets with french names, exits in french, and Quebec drivers makes driving a little challenging. Throw in a few inches of snow and it's downright dangerous, but we had cancelled the trip the weekend before due to freezing rain so I was determined not to cancel again. We crossed over the border with no issue--I find that when you tell the border officials that your purpose is birding they ask very few questions after that, since who would make up such a thing? A generous birder in Montreal had e-mailed be detailed directions to some of the recent sightings of the owls in and around Montreal, so with the help of google we headed along the snowy streets toward the west side of Montreal to begin our quest. One of the places the owls had been reported was Blvd Gouin, which happens to be the route to Ile Bizard, so we started there but had no luck along the road so we continued over to the nature park on Ile Bizard. At the park we were told that a Great Gray Owl was sighted the previous day along one of the nature trails, about a half mile in, so we decided to give that a try. The region was blanketed in about 1-2 feet of snow, with about 4" of fresh snow from the previous night, so everyone in the bustling park was on skis or snowshoes--except us. It was fairly laborious to trudge along the snowshoe path, so we didn't venture very far before we encountered a photographer, also on foot, who informed us that she didn't have any luck finding the owl today. Pressed for time we headed to our next destination, Cap St Jacques, where 3-4 owls had been seen the previous weekend. We weren't sure what Cap St Jacques was, but it turned out to be a very lovely park located on a small peninsula that juts out into the St. Lawrence River. The park had numerous ski, snowshoe, and foot trails and was bustling with people. The nicest asset of the park was that even the foot trails were groomed--packed down so that literally anyone could enjoy the park in the winter. At the visitor center we were informed that owls had in fact been seen, but that "it was up to us to find them". We weren't sure with the language barrier whether they didn't know where they were, or if they just didn't want to tell us, as some people are hesitant to disclose an owl's location since the owls are often harassed by photographers who try to flush the birds or even bait them with mice in order to get the perfect shot. So we set off blindly and hiked for about 2 hours in the park with no signs of any owls. The only birding highlight was a flock of about 80 Bohemian Waxwings, which are always a treat to see. We had directions to another owl in Laval, but by the time we returned to the parking area we only had about an hour of daylight remaining, not enough time to drive to Laval. We started thinking about finding overnight accommodations for the four of us, like how cheaply we could rent a room and who would sleep on the floor, so that we could try again tomorrow. But before giving up completely we decided to keep driving around the island, aimlessly at this point, hoping to see something. So from the park we turned left to continue down Blvd Gouin, hoping to find some open fields along the way. About ten minutes into our drive someone yelled "what's that?!" and I looked up to see the silhouette of a very large bird perched in the top of a tree across an open field. We all jumped out of the car overflowing with excitement to see a Great Gray Owl, perched patiently about 1000 feet away.

The Great Gray Owl gliding across the field at dusk

After exchanging high-fives we all set up our spotting scopes and took turns admiring the owl as it sat in the tree across the field, constantly turning its head to look and listen for prey. Owls hunt mainly at dawn and dusk, and being only minutes from sunset we were treated to a fine display of its hunting abilities. Within a few minutes the owl flew from its perch and glided low over the field for about 100 feet before plunging into the snow after its prey. Due to a hump in the landscape we were unable to see what it had captured, but it appeared to be a successful plunge because a few minutes passed before the owl returned to its perch. We watched it make a few more hunting attempts, in complete awe of its appearance, which really was like a ghost drifting through the air. We spent about 20 minutes watching the owl before the light began to fade and we headed back to our car, thrilled by our success.

When I returned home and reported my sighting to E-bird I saw that 8 other owls were reported in Montreal that same day, including 2 others in the area where we had been. It seems that either numbers of owls are increasing or more birders are seeking them out, but either way it seems the chances of finding one are fairly good. So if you have a passport, a day off, and a map of Montreal I highly recommend making the trip up there to see these owls, as it may be another 8 years before they're seen again.