> Regarding Saw-whet Owls, Chris Hill:
>
> >...So it seems, based on limited looking, like there are
> >quite a few Saw-whets "out there" in winter in W.
> >Washington. <clip>... I haven't seen big numbers on
> >W Washington counts <clip> ...are the low totals on local
> >christmas counts due to low numbers of Saw-whets, or
> >to people not looking? How often do you expect to find
> >this species in winter around here?

Dave Nunallee:

> One of my pet peeves is the standard statement in many birding books,
> "Common in proper habitat", and with no other group of birds than owls is
> this phrase more over-used. IMHO, owls are among the most difficult of
> birds to find...<snip>

Dave,

I agree - the words "common" and "abundant" are pretty empty unless the
author defines them strictly (e.g. common = 25-50 seen per locality per
day, which is obviously *not* what the author meant about pygmy owls, I'll
wager).

DN> ...I have come to the following conclusions:
>
> 1. The vast majority of owl sightings are made by a very few birders.
<snip>

To me this suggests that the owls must be out there, but that only a few
birders know how to find them. That is, I suspect that the few who see
the vast majority are using playback of conspecific vocalizations at
night, can identify the responding owls by ear, and know something about
what habitats to look in, while the birders who seldom see owls don't
have the same know-how, or the same persistence, maybe. On the other
hand, you observed that:

> 2. The vast majority of owl sightings are made in the same localities, by
> the same people, year after year, particularly on Christmas bird counts. If
> you know the best localities, you can find 'em; if you don't, you
> can't.<snip>

...which suggests that the owls really are rare, and that it is special
knowledge of particular locations, rather than more general knowledge of
habitat preferences, that makes the difference between those who see lots
of owls and those who don't.

I'll throw in my two cents worth, based on my experiences back east: I
think it's unlikely that the owls are reliably in certain locations year
after year, but absent elsewhere. I bet that if Gene Hunn and Richard
Rowlett and Andy Stepnewski each find their owls only at a few sites, then
that says more about their habits than the habits of the owls, and the
rest of us ought to be able to find our own elsewhere.

Back in western Massachusetts, where I lived for a dozen years before
coming out here, there was an explosion over the last decade of Saw-whet
Owl reports, which seems to have been almost 100% propelled by changes in
the way they were looked for. It used to be that about a half dozen were
reported in the region every year, on average. An "average Joe"
birdwatcher might only find one once a decade or so. When you asked how
common the species was locally, answers were vague, at best. But a few
gung-ho owl enthusiasts led the way by showing the rest of us what a
reasonable whistled imitation of an owl call and a lot of persistence in
the pre-dawn hours could accomplish, and totals on local christmas counts
reflected that.

On one count the saw-whet totals looked like this for the next 6
years (from my porous memory, but approximately correct): 2, 2, 13, 42,
15, 60 (!). That count circle was pretty much all good habitat for
saw-whets (i.e., cool woods with open clearings and swamps mixed in), and
obviously, the conditions were near perfect in the two years when they
topped 40. But on another Western Mass. count I used to do, they had the
following totals this year: 37 Eastern Screech-owls, 20 Great Horned, 5
Barred, a Long-eared, and 3 Saw-whets. Different species, but still lots
of owls. A good year for them, but not atypical. And at this point, it's
not only the two or three gung-ho people finding owls on the christmas
counts; the "bug" has caught on with large numbers of birders.

So, while I'm wondering about Saw-whets in particular, I guess with my
original post I also hoped to find out whether it was commonly understood
here in Washington that playback is the only effective way to find owls
(except, of course, for Short-eared and Snowy).

As long as I'm touting playback, I should mention that I try not to
harass birds with it. My rule of thumb is: don't play back to the same
owl more than twice a year at most. If an individual owl is widely
publicized, others are likely to play back to it, I avoid playback at that
site altogether.

Dave again:> 3. Serendipitous owl sightings are really pretty
uncommon...<snip>

Practically nonexistent for some owl species. I've only ever found
one Eastern Screech-owl in daylight in my life, although they have
been the most common owl where I lived for most of my life. And
really, that was only partially serendipity - it took 20 minutes of
hard searching to find it after noticing that a flock of small birds
was mobbing something. On the other hand I have heard over 100 at night...


> As far as Saw-whet Owls specifically are concerned, there are a few
> locations where they seem to be found year after year. Some spots I know
> about include Samish Island, the dike along the Skagit wildlife area on Fir
> Island, and of course Reifel Refuge near Ladner, B.C..

I'd heard about Reifel - thanks for the tip about the Skagit and Samish
Island. Those sound like the type of place where Saw-whets would find
abundant rodent food, and have limited available roost sites with all the
open fields around - perfect for finding them during the day.

Chris Hill
Everett, WA
cehill at u.washington.edu