With so many snowy owls in the region this winter, birders
and photographers have been particularly successful in spotting and shooting
(photographically speaking!) these beautiful birds. The well-known locales
where snowies have been sighted are big draws for hopeful viewers.
We’re hunters. We seek the thrill of seeing wild creatures
close up. We want to experience their beauty and dignity. We bundle up, drag
out our gear, and complain about the wind chill, all to witness the real
hunters, whose survival depends upon their focus, their senses, their quickness—and
freedom from distraction.
Snowies are not easy to spot. Protective coloration works
like a charm, and despite being large, once they are patiently hunkered down,
scanning for rodents, they can be all but impossible to detect. Even in motion they fly low and are well camouflaged.
Your best bet in spotting one is patience and a pair of
binoculars … or watching for clusters of people. When someone spots a snowy, he
stares into the distance, and whoever comes along asks, “What do you see?”
Saturday, I was with my husband and was hoping he’d
see an owl, which is much more exciting than just looking at the photos I come
home with. But the road to the location
that had been successful for me a couple of weeks ago was closed. People
reported seeing owls, but they were so far out in the marsh they were invisible
to the naked eye.
It didn’t look hopeful. But the point is to enjoy what
nature gives you on any given day. So I snapped a picture of wild turkeys on
the roadside…because they were there and I had a camera. They foraged and paid
us no mind.
We watched a beautiful red-tail hawk ride wind currents,
while scanning for prey. Later he sat, all handsome, on a branch while a crowd
gathered beneath him. He was oblivious
to the gathering paparazzi; there’s no time for distractibility when your life
depends upon a successful hunt.
We pulled into a turn-off where there was a small cluster of
people. I stepped out of the car to see a people looking skyward. I swung my
camera up with just enough time snap a few shots of what turned out to be a
juvenile bald eagle before he took off for better hunting grounds. Did he
notice us? If so we were not of interest.
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We headed further north to a spot where people said a snowy
had been hunting all day. And sure
enough, the snowy grapevine was correct. She was there…and so were the
people. Thankfully the owl was separated
from the crowd by a drainage depression in the marsh, which prevented those who
push the limits from getting too close to the bird, forcing it to move on.
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If I had to hunt for survival, could I tune out the
paparazzi? I’m not sure. And that
thought makes me all the more respectful of the wild creatures I observe.
I
wish everyone was.
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Keep close to
Nature's heart... and break clear away, once in awhile, and climb a mountain or
spend a week in the woods. Wash your spirit clean. None of Nature's landscapes
are ugly so long as they are wild. ~John Muir
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