Owl Banding

It has been an interesting and reasonably productive week. In last week’s owl update, we expressed our hope that the late May push of Northern Saw-whet Owls (NSWO) that we often experience would occur this spring and might even start earlier this year. Thankfully, saw-whet migration did pick up this past week, including the [...]

Things picked up a bit this past week, but the owl migration has remained relatively slow. We banded 58 owls this past week, 25 of those occurring on May 5. The Northern Saw-whet Owl (NSWO) numbers started dropped off on April 16, and we hit a double-digit night on May 5 for the first time [...]

The owl migration has been unexpectedly slow this past week. Since banding 16 owls on April 24, we have only banded nine more. This is typically within the period of peak owl migration at WPBO, and we have had a few nights of good weather conditions. We’re at a loss as to why the [...]

The owl migration slowed a bit this past week but remained steady. After the record night of 71 Long-eared Owls (LEOW) on April 9, we have not banded more than 18 LEOW on a given night. We're seeing a few more of last year's young mixing in with the adults, but that transition has [...]

Although the weather slowed things down a bit, it was another productive week. While our numbers were down from last week, the owl diversity that Whitefish Point is famous for picked up a bit in recent nights. We banded five Boreal Owls (BOOW) this week, including four on April 15. This would not have [...]

After getting skunked on April 3, the owl migration finally kicked in this past week, including a night when we banded 110 owls — 39 Northern Saw-whet Owls (NSWO) and 71 Long-eared Owls (LEOW). This total represents the second-biggest night of owl banding ever at WPBO. The LEOW total is a new nightly total [...]

Although the weather conditions were not great again this past week, they did improve, and thankfully, the owl migration did, too. Given the weather, it was a relatively productive week, including a few highlights. We banded 51 owls and recaptured seven previously-banded owls. Species diversity has not kicked in yet, and 49 of the [...]

Coming into this past week, we knew the weather would be a challenge, but we did not expect this. Since our last update, actually since March 15, we have only banded two owls. The season's first Long-eared Owl (LEOW) was banded on the first net check on March 21. Conditions were not too bad [...]

We're happy to be back for Nova's 20th spring season of owl banding at WPBO! As many of you may know, we have had a mild winter, and the conditions in late February and early March felt more like mid-spring. Unfortunately, the past few nights have brought along the winter weather we are more [...]