Christmas Bird Count January 3, 2009

Saturday was the Christmas Bird Count. About 50 volunteers covered a 7.5 mile radius circle around the Tri-City area. I was on a team with Phil Bartley, an expert birder. I mostly tallied what he spotted. We had an adventure. We drove out Clodfelter Road south of Kennewick to look for Chukar. Phil spotted two Ravens jumping up and down on the ground. He said he got the feeling there was an owl. I thought it was a log. It wasn't moving. He got out the scope and we both looked, and couldn't tell what it was. We started treking across a frozen plowed, crunchy snow-covered field. Even as we got close, I thought it was a piece of wood. But Phil was right. Not only was it an owl, It was a rare find, and not even on our list of birds. A gorgeous Short-eared Owl was lying on its back freezing. It moved. I knew who to call. My friend, Marilyn, is a volunteer for Blue Mountain Wildlife Rehabilitation Center and transports birds for them. I took my coat off and Phil wrapped it up and carried it back to the car. I called Marilyn, and she told me to take it to a farm that is a satellite center. I held the light, fragile, warm bundle of feathers on my lap hoping it was still alive. When we found the farm, Michelle took it from me and gently unhooked each talon from my jacket. She felt a break in the wing, but it was alive and looking better than when we found it. She put it in a covered cage in a heated shed. While we were there Michelle showed us a pine tree on the farm where Long-eared Owls come to spend the winter. We counted 12! What a treat. Then we saw a Cooper's Hawk perched in a tree. Too bad we were just outside the count circle, so we couldn't count them on our list.
We went back to counting. Our best finds were two Varied Thrushes and four Red-breasted Nuthatches. I counted hundreds of starlings, and lots of crows, Rock Pigeons, and magpies. Every year we find one Long-eared Owl in the same area. In 20 degree weather on icy snow, Phil had to walk around every tree to find it. I just walk the path and look for it to fly out of the tree, but my toes and fingers were frozen by the time we found it.
Phil had a funeral to attend, so I carried on after meeting the rest of the Kennewick teams for lunch. I just counted more of the same. I found a flock of 36 Mourning Doves lined up on telephone lines. I've never seen that many together. And I found a tree full of crows and magpies. We are the Black-billed Magpie capital of the world! We have the highest count in the nation most years.
Before I left for the Christmas Count Potluck where we tally all the birds that were sighted, I called Michelle to see how the owl was doing. She was transporting it to meet Lynn, of Blue Mountain Wildlife, and was halfway to Pendleton when the owl died. We were hoping for a happy ending. Short Eared Owls are on the decline, and we hoped they could save it. I found the photo above on a free photo site, so you can see how beautiful these owls are.