Where can I get a great gray owl for education?

Okay, I'm stealing a blog technique from Neil. Whenever he gets several emails with basically the same question, he answers it in his blog, so I'm going to do that here. Many want to know if they can get a great gray owl carcass mounted or a permanently injured owl for educational purposes.

First, in order to have either, you have to have state and federal permits for education--even to get a mounted dead owl. You can't just have a mounted great gray sitting on top of the tv, there's no way US Fish and Wildlife will give a permit for that. The hundreds of owl carcasses are being sent to various research facilities and you can check this article from the Minneapolis Star Tribune to read more about that and I would contact Bob in the article to find out how you can get a mounted owl.

Second, The Raptor Center has some injured great grays but the chances of any of them qualifying as an education bird are slim to nil at this point. Apparently the great gray doesn't have the temperment suited for a bird to do public programs. I asked our assistant bird curator at The Raptor Center if we would get an education great gray and she said she felt lucky if we would be able to get a mounted owl.

Birdchick is Sweeping the Country

I've made it ino the Bangor News as have the owls. I was excited about this and had a moment of minor panic that a certain researcher will lash me for the use of "invasion" as opposed to "irruption" in the article...

I'm very excited, a group of ladies from work and I are planning a trip to Nebraska to see sandhill cranes in March. I don't know if we're going to do the Rivers and Wildlife Celebration but we will get out for some sandhill crane and snow goose action. If you've never done this you really should...unless of course you are trying to come see owls in Minnesota, that should take priority in 2005, but at some point Nebraska in March should be on your list of birding trips.

Hoo Wee

Some days I just feel like people are making life a lot harder than it needs to be. I'm busy all day long, but don't get anything worthwhile accomplished. And then one of my customers will send me a photo like this that makes me smile and glad to be alive.

A meeting of the minds:

I wonder what kinds of pleasantries a first year goshawk and a mallard pair would exchange? I also can't help but notice the male mallard is gallantly positioning the female in front of him.

Eagles

Today was the second of our Valentine's Day Eagle Tours. This was a rowdier crowd, but a fun crowd. The morning started out beautiful, one of those "ah, this is the reason why I enjoy winter"

The view just outside The Raptor Center this morning.

We made a side trip to see the gyrfalcon, and got completely skunked on that. However, the eagles at Colville Park put on quite a show: flying and diving for fish. There was one young female eagle who kept trying to boss around all the others on the ice, she seemed full of piss and vinegar.

Oh, and for the tour participant who scoffed at my holding my digital camera to Amber's spotting scope:

I took this photo of seven eagles. Digi scoping does work. These may not be award winning photos, but they work for souvenirs or sometimes even documenting rarities.

We had an older couple sitting behind me that kept cracking me up, partly with his jokes my favorite being, "When you're hunting, how do you attract rabbits? Make noise like a carrot." Plus they had that wonderful banter of a couple that's been married almost too long.

Another fun story was a guy who decided to take his lady friend on a unique first date. Most first dates are dinner, drinks, maybe a museum. This guy told the lady of his affections that he wanted to take her to hear the owls in Roseville. Now, I think this is a gutsy move. First, you're taking a lady for a first date out into the middle of the woods after dark. Birders I'm sure would think, "yes, how romantic" normal people would think "uh oh, ax murderer". When they finally get down the dark ravine to hear the barred owls, he begins hooting. A birder would probably critique the hooter on his accent and cadence. A normal person would think, "hm, does this person need an appointment at Hazelden?" Well, all will be happy to know that the owls answered the young man back, the lady was impressed by his ability to talk to the owls and they are still a couple. Ya gotta like that, a guy takin' a risk and gettin' the girl, all through the power of birds.

Owl Irruption and Disapproval

My favorite email of the week is from owl researcher Bill Lane:

sharon.
it's not a migration. it's not an invasion. it's an irruption. jeeez.

bill

I have been guilty of calling this large concentration of great gray owls in Minnesota a "migration" and an "invasion" both of which my brain finds sexier terms than "irruption". I feel bad for irritating researchers, I love the so. Irruption just sounds too much like a zit gone wrong or that blazing owls are oozing down the streets and melting cars and smothering people. Anyway, for my poor use of avian terminology, I give myself one disapproving rabbit.

I disapprove of owl migration...I disapprove of owls in general.

Drunken Waxwings

Cedar Waxwings got drunk and flew into some windows in an office park in South Carolina was the top story for a local news station. You can watch the video here, there's nothing sadder than a drunk waxwing.

Disapproving Eagle

"I disapprove of rabbits that I cannot eat!" This is Leuc, one of the education bald eagles at The Raptor Center.

Amber and I did the first of our "Take Your Sweetheart to See Eagles Tour" today and couldn't have had better weather. I hope it keeps until our second one on Monday. We saw mostly adult bald eagles and only a few juveniles. We did get an unexpected bonus of six trumpeter swans and lots of common mergansers. We stopped at various places along the Mississippi but our best stop was Colville park where the trees were just loaded with them.

Tree chock full of bald eagles at Colville Park in Redwing, MN.

What surprised me was that this was a rather quiet laid back crowd. They were very excited about the eagles but not some of the pranksters that we normally have. I will say it was a generous crowd, we ended up signing up eleven people as member of TRC, that will help feed a lot of birds in clinic.

Incidentally, I ran into one of the flight crew at TRC today and she told me that this is the first month that great gray owls make up the largest percentage of our patients. As she was leaving the building she had hold of a great gray owl that had been recovering and was going to be test flown and execised to prepare it for release. It had a green spot on its bill. I asked what that was from and she said normally they put color bands on the legs of the raptors so they can tell them apart in the clinic flight rooms, but the great grays sit so low on their feet that you can't see the bands. In order to tell them apart, they put little dabs of color on their bills.

Bird Chick on Amazon.com

Well the 2006 Birding Calendars are officially in motion. They are listed on Amazon, they're not available yet buy you can sign up to be the first to order one. It's so weird, I have just gotten used to writing 2005 for the date, my calendars are soon to be available for 2006 and I'm already working on calendars for other states for 2007. I hope this isn't messing with the space time continuum too much.

Seriously, I need to finish the other book.

Owl Stories Pouring In

Well this blog has temporarily gone to the owls. Next week I am leading an eagle tour with Amber so we will talk about other birds. People have been so kind with all their emails and sharing their owl stories. I had to share this photo from Mart and Suze Eldridge who are supporters of Project Wildlife in San Deigo.

Mart and Suze had barn owls nesting in their Mexican Fan Palm Tree.

One of the young birds fell out and Mart and Suze got someone from Project Wildlife to get the young bird the help it needed. Barn owls are usually something you associate with a farm in the midwestern country side. I just love this photo of the young owl aroung these tropical looking plants.

Okay, today I'm supposed to be working very hard on finishing my Urban Birdfeeding Book, so if I don't reply to emails don't take it personally. I'm just trying not to tick off my publisher.

My wonderful employees

For those that may have missed the NBC segment, you can view it at MSNBC.com.

I swear, you leave one bird encased in ice, several layers of foil and a couple of freezer bags and your husband labels you a freak and possibly an unsafe cook. Personally, I think it's his fault for digging into mystery items in the fridge. I don't see what he's complaining about, it's just a little waterthrush that flew into a window (I keep meaning to take to the Bell Museum and keep forgetting--and for those curious, I do have a permit for that bird in my freezer). If non-birding Bill is upset by a tiny frozen warbler, I don't even want to begin to think of what he'd say about the partially crushed great-horned owl in the freezer at work. My employees don't complain, but then again I'm in charge of their checks.

Speaking of which, it's time for me to do performance appraisals at work. I always joke that the gifts should start pouring in this time of year, and a few employees have taken me seriously (one learned of my love of bacon and got me a rasher of the fanciest bacon I've ever eaten). Last week Denny got me owl pellets...and not just any owls pellets, but long-eared owl pellets, it's not every day you get one of those. After a hectic day I dissected them and found two rodent skulls in each and wished I had more of an interest in learning rodent anatomy. I have no idea what these four critters used to be but I had fun digging them out of the little black fur wads.

Long-eared owl pellets from Denny.

Two skulls were found in each pellet. Alas, I don't know what type of rodent, if I did then I would be the rodent chick which just doesn't have a nice of ring to it as bird chick does.

Well, I better clean up my mess, non-birding Bill doesn't appreciate exploded owl pellet all over the coffee table.