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Close encounter with Snowy Owls (1 Viewer)

Edward

Umimmak
Iceland
Last Saturday was one of those days in the field that I’ll look back on in years to come and think “remember the day that…” and I’ll get a shudder up my spine as I recall the experience.

After two birders had independently seen a male Snowy Owl on a remote upland plateau in western Iceland within a couple of weeks, four us couldn’t resist the temptation to look for this rare and highly sought after species. It should be pointed out that the second birder was satisfied that the bird was not breeding and therefore told us where it was. Breeding Snowy Owls are extremely rare in Iceland and information on their whereabouts is of course kept strictly confidential.

After a fairly long drive during which we stopped to check on Iceland’s burgeoning Shelduck population, a very recent but seemingly successful colonist, and then admired a massive adult White-tailed Eagle fly over the road apparently unaffected by the attentions of two mobbing Arctic Skua we approached our destination. The road turned away from the rocky coast, heading through increasingly desolate landscape, as the road ascended. Not a tree in sight, no signs of human interference save the road itself and an emergency shelter for motorists crossing this route in winter, the plateau stretched out of view, snow on the upper reaches to the north and west. To the north-west the low clouds were dazzlingly white, indicating the presence of a sizeable ice cap just hidden from view. We turned off the main road onto an unsurfaced road and felt the keen anticipation of encountering our target. After about a kilometre something white suddenly caught my eye and I yelled STOOOOOOOOPPPPPP!!!!!!! Sitting on a rock below the brow of a small ridge was a pristine male Snowy Owl, about 300 metres away. We stopped the car and carefully got out of the car and set up our scopes and were bewitched by this unforgettable wraith of the tundra. As a male it was almost pure white, with just a few black spots on its wings. This was undoubtedly the same bird which BF member Jakob S found and posted in the gallery here. For twenty minutes we watched it preen, yawn and we were all struck by how “cat-like” its face was, and when it stretched it revealed its massive feathered feet. And then all of a sudden it was gone! We looked away and looked back and none of us had even seen it go.

There was nothing for it but to drive on, and we soon relocated it, this time in flight, it always took three deep beats and then went on an extended glide before settling around 1 km away. A friend had described a Snowy Owl in flight as a “neckless Whooper Swan” and it seemed an apt description. As we had already had great views of the bird, it was mid afternoon and one of us had a dinner party to go to that evening we begin to think about getting home. We never dreamed we’d be on the moors for another seven hours.

About three kilometres on Yann, nicknamed “the Finder,” suggested we scope the plateau to the south for the hell of it. After a few seconds of looking through the scope it was obvious that something had piqued his curiosity. Soon we were all looking at a minute white speck just below the horizon. For the next 30 minutes we were glued to this spot, our opinions alternating between snow drift (there were still some patches in the area), pale rock, sheep or…….. Looking on the map we estimated that it was at least 5 kilometres away from us and the heat haze combined with problems of looking through 60x magnification made it difficult to assess it properly. After while we all began to be convinced that it was moving but was the haze playing tricks on us? After half an hour this snow drift unmistakably started moving and then suddenly the “sheep” sprouted wings and ghosted away. To our astonishment another white bird flew up from an unseen position and followed it over the ridge. We were staggered and ecstatic to have found two new Snowy Owls just like that!

It was now gone four o’clock and we convinced our companion who was due at a dinner party in two and a half hours in a town at least four hours’ drive away that he was going to miss it anyway so he might as well miss it in style. We were determined to get a better look at the new Snowy Owls so we parked the car and got our things together and set off across the frost-shattered plain. If your idea of bleak is the North York Moors then think again. But although these uplands seem lifeless they are home to a delicate and hardy ecosystem of birds, invertebrates and Arctic flora. What seems barren comes to life as you pay it attention. Look, a spider scuttles across the moss-stained rocks, tiny pale moths spring up at every footstep, a beautiful Glacier Buttercup ekes out a living on the sparse soil, a cluster of delightful Arctic Poppies nod gently in the breeze, and isolated pockets of Alpine Speedwell colonise the slopes. Our path, we have to make our own as this is as much off the beaten track as you can get, leads up and down parallel ridges, over small streams lined with moss of the most intense green. A sudden pepepepepepe alarm call alerts us to the presence of a pair of Purple Sandpipers and a newly fledged chick only metres away. Although I see hundreds if not thousands of these in winter its always a thrill to see such confiding summer plumaged birds on their breeding grounds. I make a mental note to visit the Canadian Arctic and its breeding waders one day.

We arrive at a small tarn, greeted by a resplendent Great Northern Diver which seems to be without a mate. Long-tailed Duck have bred here this summer though and two family parties dive for prey. Whooper Swans and a pair of Arctic Tern also inhabit the lake and just a few feet away a male Ptarmigan thinks its camouflaged plumage has fooled us, much to the delight of the two photographers amongst us. As we climb the next shallow ridge we are thrilled to see one of the Snowy Owls on a rock a couple of hundred metres away from us. We quickly set up scopes and notice that this bird is much darker than the first bird we saw in the day and has light barring on its breast, head and wings. We’re not sure whether it’s a young male or a lightly marked adult female. Whilst certainly aware of our presence it doesn’t appear perturbed and eventually we get to within one hundred metres of it. It continues to preen, yawns, swivels its head in inimitable owl style, and then suddenly swivels its head to its right and fixes it on something of interest. It spreads its wings, flaps twice and glides to a rock fifteen metres away. We gasp in awe its grace. Now the owl is concentrating on something very close to it and then it pounces, seems like the easiest thing in the world. Whatever it is has no chance and the owl flies off to another rock 300 metres away plucks its prey, obviously a bird, and very probably a Purple Sandpiper, and swallows it whole. We walk over to investigate the rock from which it initially saw its quarry and realise that this is the place we first spotted it from by the car. A quick check on the GPS reveals that we had been 4.7 km away when we first noticed that minute speck of white on the hillside! The rocks are white with owl droppings and we find a huge moist pellet, more than 10 cm long, which I’m persuaded to put in my pocket, owl feathers, and scattered bones. Over the next hour we watch from a suitable distance this magnificent predator in its natural habitat, as it mostly dozes, preens and does some more yawning. We find several more favoured owl perches, all prominent grass covered knolls, covered in droppings and curiously all without fail being covered in Ptarmigan droppings. I foresee a serious conflict of interests, with only one possible outcome!

A dog-like yipping reaches our ears and an Arctic Skua appears and begins to mob the Snowy Owl causing it to find a new perch about 500 metres away. We go to its last vantage point and note the same combination of owl and Ptarmigan droppings. As we look around my eyes catch a fortress like rock belt and on the top a white spot. The third owl!! This one is definitely an adult male but not quite as white as the one we saw by the road a few hours earlier. After once more indulging in prolonged views of another Snowy Owl, we decide that it is time to head back to the car, starving as we are. We give the female/young male a wide berth, on the way back but we were happy from observing their behaviour that these birds were not breeding and that our disturbing them had been kept to a minimum. We are almost certainly the first humans they have seen there this summer. The walk back to the car, six kilometres in a straight line but lengthened by detours around tarns and up and down ridges, seems impossibly long but numerous family parties of Snow Buntings and Purple Sandpipers, not to mention the ubiquitous Golden Plover, keep us company. And if we need an owl fix all we need to do is turn round because the female/young male is visible almost all the way back from its lofty vantage point. We return to the car almost six hours after we had set out, hungry, thirsty and shattered but absolutely elated to have shared this time with the three Snowy Owls and the other birds of the moors. This was Iceland birding at its best, underlining why I find birding so exciting here, and it reminded me why I could never really seriously consider leaving my adopted island.

We arrived home at 2.30 in the morning, 7.5 hours late for the dinner party.

E
 
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Brilliant, Edward! No wonder you left Manchester!!! There's a white carrier bag blowing around in the street at the moment that if I purposely blur my vision sort of looks a bit Snowy Owlish...

Tom McEnviousofedward
 
Thanks for the report & excellent read Edward. You have acquired the talents of Viking oral tradition!
Thought about writing for the Islandic Tourist board? >> I'll have to add Iceland to my places to visit soon list. ;)
 
Steve G said:
Thanks for the report & excellent read Edward. You have acquired the talents of Viking oral tradition!
Thought about writing for the Islandic Tourist board? >> I'll have to add Iceland to my places to visit soon list. ;)

Iceland was already on my list - now it's moved to the top! Thanks for this Edward - it's a wonderful story.
 
Edward said:
Last Saturday was one of those days in the field that I’ll look back on in years to come and think “remember the day that…”

...This was Iceland birding at its best, underlining why I find birding so exciting here, and it reminded me why I could never really seriously consider leaving my adopted island...

E
I notice from your 'profile' that you list literature. Well, I don't know what kind of literature you enjoy, Edward, but I am guessing travel writing is among it. You could surely easily have that account published - it had me enthralled from opening to ending. What a wonderful country and so evocatively described.
 
Many thanks for the kind comments. If any of you do decide to come to Iceland in the future be sure to get in touch in advance and I can put you on to some great sites, birding or otherwise. I wouldn't bank on seeing Snowy Owl though, it's taken me a long time and then three turn up at once.

We actually explored a mere fraction of the suitable habitat in the area, and I might be persuaded to go back and check more areas next week. The old Icelandic sagas didn't tend to have sequels but .......

E
 
I've spent many hours searching for Snowy Owls but have been successful on all too few ocassions. The hours spent and the miles travelled become unimportant when I do succeed in finding one. They are magnificent!
 
What a great experience, Edward.


Edward said:
Breeding Snowy Owls are extremely rare in Iceland and information on their whereabouts is of course kept strictly confidential.
I'm surprised you need to be so secretive in Iceland. What's the problem? Not egg collectors, surely? Persecution?
 
Bluetail said:
I'm surprised you need to be so secretive in Iceland. What's the problem? Not egg collectors, surely? Persecution?

It's so we can get a good one on the year list at the expense of others ;-)

Snowy Owls are covered by the same law as birds such as Gyr Falcon and White-tailed Eagle, i.e. totally protected and it is forbidden to knowingly come within 500 metres of an occupied nest. Snowy Owls have only bred a handful of times since the 1950s but are probably present in varying numbers all year, an average of 10 get reported annually. The Nat. Hist. Inst. just has a strict policy of releasing no site information on rare breeding birds, including regulars such as Grey Phalarope or one off breeders such as Collared Dove (which MAY be breeding in Reykjavík this year for the first time since 1971).

Egg collecting is a minor problem but it does happen, and there are always a few idiots who like to shoot birds for fun, the bigger the better. I've heard of one responsible wildfowl hunter being offered £1,000 if he could provide a Snowy Owl for stuffing. The hunter warned this person that if he ever heard of a Snowy Owl being shot then the collector's carcass would be next in line at the taxidermist.

E
 
Brilliant tale Edward.
The last time drove over this plateau (~2 weeks ago) I did not manage to spot any Snowy Owls, but I saw one Gyr falcon very near the location I saw the snowy earlier this summer.
 
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