I thought those not on the Birdchat list might be interested in this, given
the reported decline in WA Burrowing Owls this year.


"On Saturday July 22 a birding group from Nature Saskatoon saw a family of
Borrowing Owls, _Athene cunicularia_ near the Gardiner Dam on the South
Saskatchewan River about 100 km south of Saskatoon.

There were six young lined up in a row on their mound watching us watching
them from our cars. A cry of alarm from one of the nervous adults sent
them
all scurrying into their borrow, only to reappear a minute later, no
doubt at a second maternal signal.

Our provincial population is feared to have dropped to about 500 pairs and
the
Burrowing Owl has been added to the list of endangered species by COSEWIC
(Committee On the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada).

On June 4, 1987, HRH Prince Philip, president at that time of World Wide
Fund for Nature, initiated Operation Burrowing Owl at a ceremony near a
Burrowing Owl colony in Saskatchewan. This project is co-sponsored by
Nature Saskatchewan, Saskatchewan Environment and Resource Management,
Saskatchewan Wildlife Federation, Wildlife Habitat Canada and World
Wildlife
Fund Canada. It is designed to protect Burrowing Owl habitat through
agreements with landowners and to improve habitat by installing nest boxes.

If anybody wants to know exactly where to see this particular nest, please
E-
mail me. Because of the precarious state of this species in Saskatchewan,
wide
distribution about specific nest sites seems not a good idea.

For more information about the status of this bird in Saskatchewan,
contact:
Saskatchewan Environment and Resource Management,
3211 Albert Street
Regina, SK
S4S 5W6

A personal question...What do we know about this owl on its wintering
grounds? Is the problem on the nesting grounds or elsewhere? Does anybody
know where this species
winters?



______________________________________________________________________________
James K. Wood Bay 25- 1501 8th St. East
E-mail..... jim.wood at duke.usask.ca Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Voice... (306)-955-1700 Canada S7H 2T6




h.curl at hazmat.noaa.gov "You may be only young once but you can be
Hazmat/NOAA, 7600 Sand Pt. Wy., NE immature the rest of your life."
Seattle, WA 98115-0070
(206) 526-6272