Subject: Hawk Owl - not seen
Date: Jan 12 19:40:00 2001
From: Jack Stephens - jstephens62 at home.com


I went back up to Blaine this afternoon, and again failed to see the
Northern Hawk Owl. I followed a figure-of-eight course between Stein, Delta
Line and Custer School roads, stopping every so often to scan trees, power
poles and fences. Unfortunately no sign of the bird, and unlike Tuedsay no
one else up there looking. Nevertheless, there is a silver lining to the
fact that I missed the owl again. Under the new 2001 ABA guidelines, if I
miss it two more times it becomes an official Nemesis Bird. Once seen a
Nemesis Bird counts as 1.25 species, allowing the possibility that your ABA
life list could actually exceed the total number of birds that exist in
North America. The new rules do make the math a little more difficult in
tallying up your list, but it is well worth it for the extra "ticks". Best
of luck to those going up this weekend, I missed it on Tuesday and it was
seen on Wednesday, so it may be something personal between myself and the
bird.

Jack Stephens
Edmonds, WA
jstephens62 at home.com