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------_=_NextPart_001_01C2EBF2.A59B5A30 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Four of us headed north, an owl moon riding high in the sky as we passed from elms to oak to aspen and finally spruce for the forest edge. We ventured north of Two Harbors towards the Boundary Waters Canoe Area till the road ended. We then headed east to Isabella and to our destination -The Stony River Forest Road - a 12 mile long reddog transect that parallels Hwy 2 for, inteesecting the Whyte road, then bends to the west and joins hwy 15. The night sky had transitioned from high haze to scattered partly cloudy, but as we jumped from our transport, it was a balmy, windless, 25 degree night - so clear there was no ring around the moon. A few strands of wispy cloud gave the illusion of an aurora, but they slid revealed themselves to be when you stared at them and they didn't change shape. We stopped every 1/2 mile till we hit 2.5, where the first owl of the night gave itself away. The plaintive whistling hoot of a Saw-Whet. We listened for several minutes, our eyes growing used to the cobalt darkness srruounding us. I imagine the daylight depths of Superior to be this color. We were immersed in it this night. Another 1/2 mile trsaveled and we were in place for another Saw-whet, this time accompanied by the wheezy bark Long-eared Owl call. Long range olw is mor elike it. this Owl was way out there. If there were any wind, we would not know it was there. Rich Peet, the recordist, stood with his new owl recording rig held over his head in the fashion of Lady Liberty while Tony Hertzel, Kim Risen and I stood silently by trying not to be reocrded for posterity as background noise. This Long-eared was barely audible to me, with Tony's catalytic disturber pinging and cracking like someone washing pots and pans in the next room. When there is no wind and no traffic noise and it is clear and you are this far away from everything, small noises are deafeningly loud, persistent, and disruptive. We stayed out all night, and the only background noises other than our own coughs and cars were a passing train, two jets, and a 20 minute span of time where we had a light 4 mph breeze. Rich was a very happy recordist. It was about 11:30 when we entered this road, fro the north end working South, and we stayed out on it until 2:30 AM. We found 16 Saw-whets, the single Long-eared, no Boreals were heard. Rich and I hiked into the thick stuff to get closer to a Saw-whet that was no the normal 1/2 mile away. We headed over the bank, our feet falling in moose tracks in the deep snow. As light as the snow cover was on the road, off-road the crust of snow came to mid- shin and made for difficult walking. In true stalking fashion, we halved the distance 3 times to the bird and found ourselves at the end about 20 feet from where it called from a cavity. A thick stand of spruce formed a wall between us and the bird. Kim explained the strange its call changes as it calls from inside the cavity, indeed we could hear it suddenly be muffled, still calling though barely audible from 20 feet. When it called from outside the hole you could hear the powereo fthe call. This is a call that travels deceptively far. This is a very big noise from a very small bird. We were beat after we made it back to the road, and we had only gone150 feet into the spruce bog. Later, around 2:30 am, Rich was up front, with Tony hanging out a window, and Kim and I in back, when Rich quietly informed us of low hoots up ahead. Tony muttered "Great Grey" as he exited his car and we all moved forward to the listening point. I have heard hundreds of owls and many wild creatures. I have listened to the bellow of bull alligators, which was the lowest sound I can recollect to this point. This hooting was extremely low in range, way below the Great Horned Male that patrols my neighborhood back home. It was about 1/3 mile away and an 8 hooter vs. the expected 5 that books talk about, whoo-whoo-whoo-whoo-whoo-whu-whu-whu with the last 3 syllables tailing off into the nether regions of infrasound. I got the distinct impression I was not able to hear the full dynamic range of this call. With the radar setup for ears that old Strix Nebulosa has, it may carry for many miles. This was a first for me, a Great Grey Owl calling on territory, and it couldn't have been more perfect. It was distant, coming from a thick forest of Spruce, and having to pull it out of the thick silence took concentration. It called in the same interval for 5 minutes as we stood there, each syllable about a second apart, with the next call 30 seconds to a minute later. . I have heard wolves howl, and this is just as wild. You should be there. I try but I just can't describe it. Rich recorded it; we'd like to play it at the paper session for everyone. Some things just have to be experienced. We stopped wherever we found mature aspen in close proximity to black spruce, targeting Boreal Owls, but to no avail . Tony and Kim were concerned that we saw 5 or 6 tracts of recent clear cuts, with trucks and skidders still staged up at some sites, and the industry seems to be specifically taking out mature aspen, which is required for Boreals. The large number of Saw-Whets, among the highest one day totals for both these birders, gave them cause for more concern as they remarked that the Saw-whets and Boreals should both be calling together. We were pretty somber to think the Boreal may be being extirpated one stand at a time along this road. The road was covered with hard ice on its entire length, yet very navigable. A 4 wheel drive is necessary for those instances where you need to turn around. Great birds, great times, i really do need to get out more. Good Birding to you all. Mark Alt Brooklyn Center, MN [email protected] "Birds and their songs are important to me, they add to my enjoyment of life" ------_=_NextPart_001_01C2EBF2.A59B5A30 Content-Type: text/html; charset=iso-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit <!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional//EN"> <HTML><HEAD> <META HTTP-EQUIV="Content-Type" CONTENT="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <META content="MSHTML 5.50.4807.2300" name=GENERATOR></HEAD> <BODY> <DIV><FONT face=Tahoma size=2></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN class=414062318-16032003>Four of us headed north, an owl moon riding high in the sky as we passed from elms to oak to aspen and finally spruce for the forest edge. We ventured north of Two Harbors towards the Boundary Waters Canoe Area till the road ended. We then headed east to Isabella and to our destination -The Stony River Forest Road - a 12 mile long reddog transect that parallels Hwy 2 for, inteesecting the Whyte road, then bends to the west and joins hwy 15. The night sky had transitioned from high haze to scattered partly cloudy, but as we jumped from our transport, it was a balmy, windless, 25 degree night - so clear there was no ring around the moon. A few strands of wispy cloud gave the illusion of an aurora, but they slid revealed themselves to be when you stared at them and they didn't change shape. We stopped every 1/2 mile till we hit 2.5, where the first owl of the night gave itself away. The plaintive whistling hoot of a Saw-Whet. We listened for several minutes, our eyes growing used to the cobalt darkness srruounding us. I imagine the daylight depths of Superior to be this color. We were immersed in it this night. Another 1/2 mile trsaveled and we were in place for another Saw-whet, this time accompanied by the wheezy bark Long-eared Owl call. Long range olw is mor elike it. this Owl was way out there. If there were any wind, we would not know it was there. Rich Peet, the recordist, stood with his new owl recording rig held over his head in the fashion of Lady Liberty while Tony Hertzel, Kim Risen and I stood silently by trying not to be reocrded for posterity as background noise. This Long-eared was barely audible to me, with Tony's catalytic disturber pinging and cracking like someone washing pots and pans in the next room. When there is no wind and no traffic noise and it is clear and you are this far away from everything, small noises are deafeningly loud, persistent, and disruptive. We stayed out all night, and the only background noises other than our own coughs and cars were a passing train, two jets, and a 20 minute span of time where we had a light 4 mph breeze. Rich was a very happy recordist. It was about 11:30 when we entered this road, fro the north end working South, and we stayed out on it until 2:30 AM. We found 16 Saw-whets, the single Long-eared, no Boreals were heard. Rich and I hiked into the thick stuff to get closer to a Saw-whet that was no the normal 1/2 mile away. We headed over the bank, our feet falling in moose tracks in the deep snow. As light as the snow cover was on the road, off-road the crust of snow came to mid- shin and made for difficult walking. In true stalking fashion, we halved the distance 3 times to the bird and found ourselves at the end about 20 feet from where it called from a cavity. A thick stand of spruce formed a wall between us and the bird. Kim explained the strange its call changes as it calls from inside the cavity, indeed we could hear it suddenly be muffled, still calling though barely audible from 20 feet. When it called from outside the hole you could hear the powereo fthe call. This is a call that travels deceptively far. This is a very big noise from a very small bird. We were beat after we made it back to the road, and we had only gone150 feet into the spruce bog. Later, around 2:30 am, Rich was up front, with Tony hanging out a window, and Kim and I in back, when Rich quietly informed us of low hoots up ahead. Tony muttered "Great Grey" as he exited his car and we all moved forward to the listening point. I have heard hundreds of owls and many wild creatures. I have listened to the bellow of bull alligators, which was the lowest sound I can recollect to this point. This hooting was extremely low in range, way below the Great Horned Male that patrols my neighborhood back home. It was about 1/3 mile away and an 8 hooter vs. the expected 5 that books talk about, whoo-whoo-whoo-whoo-whoo-whu-whu-whu with the last 3 syllables tailing off into the nether regions of infrasound. I got the distinct impression I was not able to hear the full dynamic range of this call. With the radar setup for ears that old Strix Nebulosa has, it may carry for many miles. This was a first for me, a Great Grey Owl calling on territory, and it couldn't have been more perfect. It was distant, coming from a thick forest of Spruce, and having to pull it out of the thick silence took concentration. It called in the same interval for 5 minutes as we stood there, each syllable about a second apart, with the next call 30 seconds to a minute later. . I have heard wolves howl, and this is just as wild. You should be there. I try but I just can't describe it. Rich recorded it; we'd like to play it at the paper session for everyone. Some things just have to be experienced. We stopped wherever we found mature aspen in close proximity to black spruce, targeting Boreal Owls, but to no avail . Tony and Kim were concerned that we saw 5 or 6 tracts of recent clear cuts, with trucks and skidders still staged up at some sites, and the industry seems to be specifically taking out mature aspen, which is required for Boreals. The large number of Saw-Whets, among the highest one day totals for both these birders, gave them cause for more concern as they remarked that the Saw-whets and Boreals should both be calling together. We were pretty somber to think the Boreal may be being extirpated one stand at a time along this road. The road was covered with hard ice on its entire length, yet very navigable. A 4 wheel drive is necessary for those instances where you need to turn around. Great birds, great times, i really do need to get out more. Good Birding to you all.</SPAN></FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN class=414062318-16032003></SPAN></FONT> </DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN class=414062318-16032003> <P><FONT size=2>Mark Alt<BR>Brooklyn Center, MN<BR>[email protected]<BR><BR>"Birds and their songs are important to me, they add to my enjoyment of life" </FONT></P></SPAN></FONT></DIV> <DIV><FONT face=Arial size=2><SPAN class=414062318-16032003></SPAN></FONT> </DIV></BODY></HTML> ------_=_NextPart_001_01C2EBF2.A59B5A30--
