Hello Ever since Boreal Owls and Great Gray Owls have be
Hello Ever since Boreal Owls and Great Gray Owls have been moving around the north shore of Lake Superior I been getting a lot of requests from birders from all over Minnesota and elsewhere about helping them locate these owls. Many times they leave me their cell phone numbers to me so when I do locate a Boreal Owl or a Great Gray Owl they ask that I call them and give them directions to the exact location of the owl. All winter season I have been sharing owl locations to these people and also to everyone on the MOU listserv. NEVER once would I ever think to say “you could always go out and find one on your own, that’s what other people do”. Also this “that’s what other people do” is a bunch of BS. Birders share exact locations on many birds such as this weekend we were sharing exact bird locations to a lot of birders who wanted to see a King Eider, Saw Whet Owl, Boreal Owl, Great Gray Owl and Snowy Owls. Never once did any of the local birders or guides say to anyone to go find your own owls because that is what everyone else does. Also it is very sad to see that the very same Long-eared Owl that Brian Byrne was asking about to see was photographed and posted on Facebook. I know a lot of the serious bird photographers in the Twin Cities area and they highly protect their Long-eared Owl locations and they also highly protect their Eastern Screech Owl locations as well. It is maddening that all of us local guides and local birders have put these very same people on owls they probably could not find on their own without our help but yet they cannot share to the MOU community their “secret” owl locations for others to enjoy. Yes, we risked putting these roosting Boreal Owls endangered from all the attention from all the birders and photographers who came in large numbers to view these owls but, those risks were ours to risk to deal with and so far there were only a few minor issues with a few. Also Boreal Owls are a threaten species in Minnesota unlike the Long-eared Owls but yet there are a few photographers out there who only want to share these owl locations among themselves. Good Lord maybe that should have been our goal was to keep these Boreal Owl sightings hidden and make people find their own owls but that type of selfishness doesn’t occur up here in the Duluth birding community and we have been proudly catering to many visiting birders for years on where to find owls and other birds that maybe of interest to them. Too bad birders like Scott Meyer who I have helped in the past and gave exact bird locations with, cannot do the same to those who are not in the loop to know where certain birds can be found. I am sure anytime one of the MOU listserv moderators will be coming on soon to end this thread but I think this topic should be talked about to some length because I think there are a lot of birders who feel out of the loop from others in the birding community who would like to be included on where to find owls and other types of bird species that maybe of interest to them. I am just a member of the MOU organization and I believe the MOU listserv is a tool for MOU members and non-members to learn about exact bird locations in Minnesota. That is why there are three MOU RBAs that come out each week telling people where they can go to see certain bird species. I also believe that is why people post bird sightings on the MOU listserv so others can find the bird too. Yes, even if the bird was submitted to ebird and that bird was sighted in Minnesota and if you know the location where the bird can be found then share the sighting. If you want me to share birds with you, then I expect you to share bird sightings with others including owl sightings. Mike Hendrickson Duluth, Minnesota MikeHendricksonGuiding.com Sax-ZimBog.com ---- Join or Leave mou-net: http://lists.umn.edu/cgi-bin/wa?SUBED1=mou-net Archives: http://lists.umn.edu/archives/mou-net.html
