As part of my class on "Owls of Washington", I offer a field trip to
Bainbridge to owl for the night. The group comes over on the last ferry of
the night from Seattle, and we owl until sunrise on Bainbridge.

It was a tough morning out. As I tell my students, many of them have a
future as a weather person; it is the only profession that I am aware of
where one can be wrong half the time and still have a job.

I had been really looking forward to going owling, as the forecast was for
cold, calm, and a rising barometer. I was awakened to a phone call
informing me that it was snowing in Seattle. Here on Bainbridge, it was a
"light mist with snow" that hung around for a good portion of the night, and
when it went away, the wind picked up. There was one brief period of
relatively calm conditions for owling.

On my way to meet the group as they came off the ferry, I made one stop to
test the waters, and had a Northern Saw-whet owl respond almost immediately.
I incorrectly took that as a good sign.



The group did get good looks at two adult Barred Owls at different
locations, though surprisingly for the season, there were no vocalizations
all night. At one stop with a Barred Owl, a Northern Saw-whet Owl responded
with a wail call, and then as we were preparing to leave, it started tooting
back at us. We had a quick chirp from another saw-whet at a usually
reliable location after a lengthy effort, but could not convince the bird to
show itself. At the last location for a saw-whet, I got a distant response,
and then a closer call. After an extremely lengthy and intense effort on
the part of my owlers, we located the bird under the canopy of several cedar
trees, and were able to watch it as it flew from perch to perch several
times. The group did get a good look at this bird.



In addition to the owls, we saw only two raccoons. There is usually a
strong positive correlation between wildlife seen and owls.



J. Acker

Bainbridge Island, WA

<mailto:Owler at sounddsl.com> Owler at sounddsl.com



A voice unspoken (or unwritten) is a voice unheard.

Be heard!