# A Snowy Day in New Jersey



## Clark (Nov 13, 2011)

Not often seen on the forum.



Contact














Guess Whooooo...











At Attention














_Bubo scandiacus_













As always,
thank you for your time.


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## Shiva (Nov 13, 2011)

We call them Harfang des Neiges in Québec. There are many around here but I never see them. I guess I have to look at your photos. Great shots!

It is also the emblematic bird for Québec.


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## Erythrone (Nov 13, 2011)

Nice pics!!!

I saw that species very often when I lived in the Quebec region, at night near the highways. But I never saw one in November! You are lucky.


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## wojtek (Nov 13, 2011)

Fantastic photos Clark !!!

What lens do you use??


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## likespaphs (Nov 13, 2011)

supercool!


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## NYEric (Nov 13, 2011)

Cool!


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## cnycharles (Nov 13, 2011)

nice pics!


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## Lanmark (Nov 13, 2011)

Awesome find! Great captures! Thanks for sharing. :clap:


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## SlipperFan (Nov 13, 2011)

Seems early for snowy owls. Good job capturing it!


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## Yoyo_Jo (Nov 13, 2011)

Great shots! :clap:


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## Dido (Nov 14, 2011)

Great pictures thanks for sharing only know them from Zoo


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## Marc (Nov 14, 2011)

I think I've only seen this in the zoo, at least not in the wild. Even though various owls live in my area I don't think I've ever seen an owl in the wild. Plenty of birds of prey though.


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## Mathias (Nov 14, 2011)

Wonderful pictures! :drool:


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## Erythrone (Nov 14, 2011)

SlipperFan said:


> Seems early for snowy owls. Good job capturing it!




I agree... Maybe not enough food in the north?


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## Clark (Nov 14, 2011)

Thank you!




wojtek said:


> Fantastic photos Clark !!!
> 
> What lens do you use??


For fun-
http://www.slippertalk.com/forum/showthread.php?t=17650


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## Clark (Nov 14, 2011)

Erythrone said:


> You are lucky.


I know.
Blew off my mother in law for this one.
We are still tight.


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## biothanasis (Nov 14, 2011)

Fantastic shots!!! Colour is imressive!!! Wonderful bird!!!


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## Heather (Nov 18, 2011)

I love owls - never seen one of these in the wild. Beautiful bird!


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## Clark (Nov 28, 2011)

If anybody is interested...

I copied this from a website.

From: David La Puma <woodcreeper AT GMAIL.COM>
Date: Mon, 28 Nov 2011 12:02:19 -0500

As Sam pointed out last week, the southbound Snowy Owl irruption is
increasing daily across the northern US border. While there are a
number of sightings missing from the eBird map (not everyone uses
eBird... yet!), it still provides a very interesting overview (Nov-Dec
2011):

http://ebird.org/ebird/map/snoowl1?...&bmo=11&emo=12&yr=2011-2011&byr=2011&eyr=2011 

(hint: toggle the year/month options to compare to other years)

During invasion years one of the first questions that comes to mind is
"what's causing the influx?". As Snowy Owls are tied to the cyclical
lemming population (as are Rough-legged Hawks) we can expect
irruptions during poor lemming years (not enough food to sustain them
through the winter) and in very good lemming years (plentiful prey
leads to high reproductive output of owls results in overcrowding on
the wintering grounds forcing more birds south). Several Arctic
biologists, being interviewed for an article on wintering raptors,
concluded that this was a very good year for most lemming populations
with "lemming population numbers close to historical highs in many
areas" (from Rob Fisher, IL. read his original post here:
http://www.freelists.org/post/wisbirdn/Lemmings-and-Snowy-Owls-no-sightings)
. Under such a scenario we would expect most of the birds heading
south to be juveniles as the adults should be more adept at defending
their wintering territories. That is the case with most of the birds
being found in Wisconsin at at least the one bird found in NJ this
winter (although I haven't investigated any of the other out-of-state
records). Aging and sexing Snowy Owls can be done in the field- but
does pose some challenges especially since we should always give the
bird enough room not to feel threatened. Kevin McGowan from the
Cornell Lab of Ornithology posted his take on the ID of such birds
back in 2001, here's the link:
http://www.birds.cornell.edu/crows/snowy.htm (thanks to Betsy Abert on
the WIBIRDN listserve for bringing it to my attention)
The Wisconsin eBird team is planning an article on the Snowy Owl
invasion for next week (they have had close to 20 individual birds
this winter), so if you're interested- check out their eBird page
here: http://ebird.org/content/wi
in a week.



Weird, had lemmings on the mind a couple of weeks ago.


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## Clark (Jan 23, 2012)

If anybody is interested...

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/23/s...irs-speculation-among-bird-watchers.html?_r=2


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## jtrmd (Jan 23, 2012)

nice photos


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