Some interesting facts from a very knowledgeable source. FYI. Mark Alt=20 Sr. Project Manager=20 Entertainment Software Supply Chain=20 Project Resources Group (PRG)=20 Best Buy Co., Inc.=20 [email protected]=20 (W) 612-291-6717=20 (Cell) 612-803-9085
-----Original Message----- From: Gord Court [mailto:[email protected]]=20 Sent: Monday, January 31, 2005 12:46 PM To: 'Alt, Mark' Subject: RE: Great Gray Owls Hello Mark: Good to hear from you and good to hear you are having a super Great Gray Owl year. We are very interested in hearing of any banding activities for gray owls or hawk owls in Minnesota this year. Banders in Alberta have probably banded between 500 and 700 great grays and nearly as many hawk owls in the last decade. We have had returns of great grays over 400 miles away and have a hawk owl that was banded in central Alberta recovered in Alaska. It is not inconceivable that your banders may be running into a few birds from out our way. As you will know, significant steps in sexing and aging great gray owls (up to 4 years) have been made in the last 10 years or so. Using these techniques, any birds that are captured should certainly be aged/sexed. We are very interested in the relative proportion of certain age/sex classes during irruptive events like the one you are now witnessing. In our last super winter, we noted that over 70% of the birds in the irruption were in their second winter of life (i.e. about 18 months old at Christmas of the irruption winter). These birds are made obvious by retaining virtually all juvenile (gray tipped) primary and secondary feathers except for primary 5 (and occasionally 6) which will be adult (shorter, wider, with no gray tip). Many of these events are also dominated by female birds, so it will be very interesting to hear of the sex of the birds captured or found dead in Minnesota this year. I summarized some of our observations on great gray irruptions in a popular article in Natural History (February 1998 Vol. 107:50-56); it may be of interest to you. As for northern hawk owl, we have also had a super year. My banding colleague, Ray Cromie has captured more than 150 individuals since the middle of October. We get wintering hawk owls in most years near Edmonton, but they are most often juveniles. This year, adult and sub-adult (second year) birds are dominating, something that suggests that rodent populations in the boreal regions have really tanked out this year. I am sure you will really enjoy the rest of the irruption - I would appreciate hearing any and all news of this event. Best of luck. Cheers Gordon Court =20 > Gordon Court, Ph.D. > Provincial Wildlife Status Biologist > Fish and Wildlife Division, SRD > 2nd Floor, Great West Life Building > 9920-108 St., Edmonton, Alberta > Canada T5K 2M4 =20 > Species at Risk Program web site:=20 > http://www3.gov.ab.ca/srd/fw/speciesatrisk/ >=20 -----Original Message----- From: Alt, Mark [mailto:[email protected]] Sent: Thursday, January 27, 2005 7:46 AM To: [email protected]; [email protected] Subject: Great Gray Owls Barb Beck gave me your contact info. I am the president of the Minnesota Ornithologists' Union and as you probably know, we have some of your owls down here. I do not know your areas of expertise and am interested in all aspects of Owl biology and behavior. What are your areas of specialty and what are your observations about these birds this winter? What questions ought we be asking this year? Any comments, advice, etc. will be shared by me with our scientific community ( our researchers and banders ) and/or our public list server, depending on the content. Please fee free to share your comments. Thank you. Mark Alt=20 President,=20 Minnesota Ornithologists Union J. F. Bell Museum of Natural History University of Minnesota 10 Church Street SE Minneapolis, MN 55455-0104 MOU.mn.org [email protected] Cell: 612-803-9085 This communication is intended for the use of the recipient to which it is addressed, and may contain confidential, personal and or privileged information. Please contact us immediately if you are not the intended recipient of this communication, and do not copy, distribute, or take action relying on it. Any communication received in error, or subsequent reply, should be deleted or destroyed.
