Sunday, September 17, 2023

How Common Are Boreal Owls in Utah's Uinta Mountains?

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

After surprising success with finding three Boreal Owls during my first attempt to locate them in Utah's Uinta Mountains in October of 2020, I began to wonder how common they might be in the high-elevation forests of Utah. I had read and studied numerous articles about Boreal Owls and noticed that Colorado and Idaho populations were often discussed. Utah was noticeably missing from many of the articles I read. The Uinta Mountains of Utah seemed like a natural bridge between the Colorado and Idaho populations, but I was having a hard time finding studies that had been done on Boreal Owls in Utah.  I wanted to know more, so I began to consider how to go about a personal endeavor to learn more.

The preferred Boreal Owl habitat in Utah seems to be above 9000' and is often inaccessible to vehicular traffic due to heavy snowfall between November and late spring. Male Boreal Owls are most vocal when establishing their breeding territories and courting their mates, so I decided that I'd try finding them again as soon as the roads opened the following spring/summer. Unfortunately, I failed to locate Boreal Owls when I drove up to proper habitat the following June. I didn't hear a single sound from any species of owl that night despite playing some recordings of several types of vocalizations. A second summer trip proved unsuccessful in terms of locating birds, but it taught me a few things about conditions that may be unappealing to Boreal Owls. After doing a little more research, especially making use of my subscription to The Cornell Lab of Ornithology's Birds of the World, I learned that males generally stop singing on their territories once they have a female using a cavity for nesting. Except for minimal contact calls and some vocalizations when the male is delivering prey to an incubating or brooding female, the birds are quiet. That makes them very difficult to locate in sprawling dense coniferous forests in the Uinta Mountains.

A third trip made during September of 2021 proved successful. It seemed to confirm that birds are  more prone to vocalizing in response to calls during the fall. As was the case the previous fall, I found multiple birds in close proximity to one another. That is when I began to wonder if I was finding family groups that were dispersing and if most of the vocal birds might be hatch-year birds and parents communicating with one another. The plumage always appeared adult-like, but I suspect that hatch-year birds are coming into their adult plumage by that time of the year if they hatched five or six months earlier.

After locating birds two falls in a row (2020 and 2021) and reporting them on eBird, the location where I found my first three was becoming more widely known and visited more frequently by local and out-of-state birders.  That's when I decided to develop a plan to plot four new locations that looked promising based on elevation, tree mix, and barriers to human traffic. I then shared the plan with a couple of friends, Terry Reid and James Loveless, who had also been studying the species locally. They were excited to work together to learn more. We wanted to prove to ourselves that the lack of Boreal Owl observations in Utah stemmed from more of an access challenge than a lack of their presence. The three of us wanted to prove that Boreal Owls were more common in Utah than birders and others realized. Perhaps our results and documentation would lead to having the species removed from the list of rare birds that get reviewed and validated by the Utah Bird Records Committee.

Terry was an eager driver with no fear of putting a fair amount of wear and tear on his tires and suspension as we traversed very rugged terrain.  The "Rocky Mountain pinstripes", courtesy of the many tree branches extending over the unmanaged rough roads, seemed to be part of the price to make exciting discoveries. James is the one who inspired me to begin my Boreal Owl endeavors when he located and photographed a Boreal Owl a few months before I found my first three in the Uinta Mountains. We became the three Boreal Owl amigos and logged hundreds of miles, many hours, and late nights to create bonding conversations and experiences. It turned out that we found Boreal Owls in each of the four new locations that I had mapped. We found them on the north slope, two locations west of Mirror Lake Highway (one on the northern end and the other on the southern end), and a spot above Soapstone Campground. We found them along Murdock Basin again the same fall.

We observed over twenty different Boreal Owls in the fall of 2022. While we aren't biologists, we did our best to document location, time, weather conditions, moon phases, and counts of individual birds. We photographed nearly every bird we found and in most cases we found two or more birds in each location. Whenever we located birds, we would drive at least a half mile or more before attempting to check for the presences of additional individuals.

We realize that populations can be cyclical and that we were primarily in the western portion of the Uinta Mountains, so we have plans to investigate other locations in 2023.

Below are some images of a handful of the more-than-twenty individuals we observed during the fall of 2022. All of our encounters and details are recorded in eBird checklists.

More to come.


Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains

Boreal Owl in Utah's Uinta Mountains




Friday, February 17, 2023

That is Not a Flicker! Owl Box Success Story

 


The motivation to install a screech-owl box sprang to life late one night in September of 2020. I had just finished a late-night call with one of my sons when a faint but familiar sound from the backyard caught my attention. I wasted no time in securing a flashlight and making my way to the backyard to hunt for a Western Screech-owl. To my delight, I discovered a pair of them calling from separate trees and joyfully stood below one a moment later.

The encounter brought to mind that I had found one roosting in one of our redbud trees above some bird feeders a few years earlier. I began to think that might be able to install a box and get one to roost in my yard for the winter...and I knew just the right spot. I got way ahead of myself in that moment and envisioned a male finding the box, attracting a female to it in the spring, and keeping watch over his mate and littles ones from inside a nearby spruce tree. I had nothing to lose by planning and executing so I collaborated with another Utah birder who'd already experienced success with screech-owl boxes, and the plan was hatched!

Speaking of plans, I found some online for how to build a nest box, but my sense of urgency outweighed the experience of building a box. I received a box within days of placing an online order. I knew that hatch-year owls, hatched earlier in the spring, would be dispersing from their family groups during the fall, so it was clear that sooner would be better than later for increasing the odds of a bird finding and using a box for the approaching winter months. 

I purchased supplies from our local Home Depot. Shortly after giving myself a minor flesh wound inside the store and getting some first aid supplies from one of the store clerks, I was bandaged up and commencing my project on our patio. Apparently, the metal brackets that I picked up for securing the box to the top of a pressure-treated 4x4 post had some pretty sharp edges or burrs on them. Whoever machined those things in the shop didn't seem to have consumer safety in the front nor center of their minds when they created their master pieces. I had to make a joke of the mishap when I realized that simply applying pressure wasn't going to stop the bleeding. I was wondering if I might have to request the proverbial "wet clean up and aisle 10", but the clerks were pleasantly entertained by my predicament and retrieved a first aid kit. I digress.

Here are some images of the process from receiving the box to digging the hole and setting the post in quikrete to affixing the box at the top of the post in a quiet and inviting location in the yard.  I can share tips should you ever decide to put up a box in your yard.

 


 


 

  

Fourteen months and who-knows-how-many glances in that general direction after installing the box, I saw my very first desired resident. I was so relieved when I looked back in that corner and proclaimed, "That is not a flicker!"  The nearby conifers turned out to be a day roost at times for an owl and the preferred preening location after an owl left the box to begin its evening activities.

Sleepy Western Screech-Owl Soaking up Some Sun


I was pretty excited to have what I believe to be the same owl return to the box again the following November (2022) through mid-February of 2023. Despite putting up a second box the previous fall and having a male and a female use the boxes at the same time for a few weeks this winter, they seem to have disappeared in favor of an alternative nesting site in recent weeks.

This story will continue should one or both choose to return. Until then, enjoy the birds and wildlife that grace you with their presence.