Fellow birders,

Yesterday (Tuesday), while checking the Lower Woodland Park (Seattle) Bald
Eagle (Haliaeetus leucocephalus) nest for signs of possible incubation
(looking for a bird immobile, hunkered down in the nest) I watched the
(subadult) female standing in the nest, gazing at nothing in particular (it
seemed) most of the time. No egg(s) yet, therefor.

Suddenly she turned her head and looked up. I scanned and scanned and
finally saw a tiny dark dot, which, on closer inspection through the scope,
turned into a first-year Bald Eagle descending rapidly out of the south. It
ended up circling over the lake in wide, lazy, circles, still 300 meters or
so up, eventually drifting out of view to the north.

The female eagle took to gazing some more, only to repeat the maneuver again
at 12:30. I gazed up again but at first could not find anything. Finally,
after a minute or so, two dots dislodged themselves from the white clouds
and became plainly visible against the blue sky. They were waaaaay up there,
I estimate close to 1000 meters. Even through the scope (25x) I got nothing
but white. However, the fact that the birds were "without noticeable heads"
and had rounded "thick" wings and their bodies appeared evenly tapered front
to back, led me to believe they could not be anything but Snowy Owls (Nyctea
scandiaca). They were gliding the whole time we (the eagle and I) watched
them, heading north, roughly over Aurora Avenue.

Never seen that before. I know it always pays to look for the reason why any
bird you're watching suddenly looks up, but this was an unexpected treat.

So what do the books say about Snowy Owl migratory behavior?

Martin Muller, Seattle
MartinMuller at email.msn.com