Saw-whet Owl Banding '10

I spent Halloween night assisting in research on the Northern Saw-whet Owl. My first experience with the project was in 2006, and I have tried to make it at least once every fall. (Click here to see past year's photos.) Despite the sacrifice of sleep, it is great to spend the evening in the woods. Even the down time between net checks can be enjoyable; listening to owls and coyotes and watching the stars. It got a little cool, but it wasn't bad if you were bundled up. The night was shaping up to be a good night for owl migration, since there wasn't a bright moon, and the previous night's wind was from the north.

We got set up at the station in Yellowwood State Forest right before dark. (You can't just leave the nets up all day.) The first net check had no owls. After waiting a half hour, we went to check again. In the first net (of nine, I think) there were two owls. I helped stabilize one of them, so that they wouldn't flop around, potentially hurting themselves or tangling themselves more. We soon found a third owl, which fit well, since there were three volunteers. The bander came and got the owls untangled. It is pretty impressive how tangled they get, which is partially due to their bodies being so tiny, while their feathers are very fluffy. And they have very sharp little talons that grasp tightly. When we got the owls out, we would put them in little tubes. Before we could get the three out, three more flew into the net. In the above picture, I am holding one owl in the net, while I have another owl in my coat.
We got the six owls weighed, measured, and banded as quickly as we could. Here, the bander holds up one of the owls. I am still amazed at how little they weigh, with Sibley listing their weight at 80 grams or 2.8 ounces! We caught some small males that might have been tinier. All in all, we caught nine owls. It was a good night.

Recording the data. You can see one of the tubes with an owl in it sitting on the notebook. Some owls were calm, others would try to scrunch their way out of the tube or to get their little needle-talons out to your hand. They are so sharp, that they don't hurt much at all. They just go in and come out cleanly. While they may not enjoy the banding process per se, the owls aren't hurt, and valuable information is collected.

Here I am, holding up one of my owls, but the owl forgot to look.

One of the most fun experiences is releasing the owls. The last owl I released was a larger (relatively speaking), calm female. I turned off my light and walked off down the fire lane. When I got a ways down the lane, I set her on my coat sleeve. Most of the time, they fly right away. She sat on my arm for twenty minutes, while we both stood still in the night woods. My eyes adjusted much slower than hers, but I could soon see her looking around and watching me. It was magical to spend some time with these mysterious little birds.

Northern Saw-whet Owl Banding

Last night I assisted bander Jeff Hammond and his wife Laura with the Indiana NSWO research, which is a large study in its sixth year. The goal is to learn about NSWO migration. Birds are banded, weighed, measured, aged, and released. I love the chance to see this tiny (~3oz) birds up close.

Northern Saw-whet Owls '07

Kelly holding one of the three owls we caught.
Look at those tiny, needle-sharp talons.


I finally got a chance to go owl banding this year. Kelly Jones and I went down to Yellowwood state forest on 11/24 to help the team of biologists in their research on Northern Saw-whet Owls. This was a big migration year for this species, with a record number of migrating owls captured and banded. I love to see these gorgeous birds up close.

Here are the season's stats from the lead bander, Ross Brittain. I thought this was very interesting.

YSF Totals:
Hatch Year = 134 (68.4%)
After Hatch Year = 10 (5.1%)
Second Year = 32 (16.3%)
After Second Year = 20 (10.2%)
Female = 136 (69.4%)
Male = 17 (8.7%)
Unknown = 43 (21.9%)

YSF Main = 124 NSWOs
YSF Sub = 72 NSWOs
Grand Total = 196 NSWOs

Foreign Recaps = 4 (2 from Linwood Springs, WI, 1 from Ontario and 1?)
Local Recaps = 10 local recap NSWOs, average 4.9 days between captures and 2.1 grams of weight lost.

A few notes on demographics... our previous five-year average is ~53% HY owls, but when I throw out two unrepresentative years (2004 & 2005) the other three years averaged 62% HY owls. The previous five years have ranged from 78-85% Females and generally 5-6% Males. Thus, we had fewer confirmed females in the population this year, and more males, compared to the previous five years. The lower female population is likely due to the fact that they weighed less from lower fat reserves
and were actually classified as unknowns. I will be able to analyze this later.

Both the Main and Sub station caught ~68% HYs, ~5% AHYs, ~16% SYs, and ~10% ASYs. However, the Main station had 75% Females compared to only 59.7% at the sub station. The Main station had 8% Males, and sub had 9.7% Males. The big difference was in the Unknown owls, the Main station had 17% Unknowns and the sub station had 30.6% Unknowns.

I will give you a more complete description of the southern Indiana season once I receive the data from Jess Gwinn's station in Newark.

Adding our 196 to Jess's 248 brings us to a total of 444 NSWOs this season. What a nice round number that happens to be 10 more than our previous 5 years combined.

One amazing thing is that we only had 10 local recapture NSWOs this year in YSF. We had 13 in YSF in 2003 when we only captured a total of 70, and they averaged 11 days between captures. This is good evidence that the NSWOs were not hanging around YSF this year.

Thanks for all of the great help this year! Happy Holidays!
Ross Brittain
Indiana NSWO Banding Coordinator

Northern Saw-Whet Owl Part 2

On Saturday night, Rich, Samantha, Ben and I joined the volunteer owl banders at the Yellowwood State Forest. This was Ben's second time, but a first for the rest of us. It was an amazing time and not too cold. We got there at 6:00 pm and left at midnight; during our time we caught 4 owls! Samantha, Rich and I all got to hold one and release it as well. It was incredible to see the owls up close. They are so cute!

Joy petting the owl. Her feathers were so soft!

Close up of the Saw-Whet Owl

This picture shows the owl during the inspection process. They band it, weigh it, measure it, and take other notes on color, fat, etc.

Joy holding the owl before releasing it.

Rich holding another owl.

Close up of Rich's owl.

Northern Saw-whet Owl

Jeff Hammond, the bander, carefully extracting the owl from the net.


Holding the owl after banding and measuring her.


Last night I got a chance to help do research on the Northern Saw-whet Owl in the Yellowwood State Forest. The NSWO is a winter resident in Indiana and is our smallest owl. The weather conditions Monday night were not great for catching owls last night, but we did catch one on our final net check. (Good weather is a cold, dark night with a light northerly breeze.) Not much is known about NSWOs, so we record as much data about them as we can; such as weight, various dimensions, sex, eye color, molting pattern, and age. Also, a metal band is attached to a leg to aid in tracking, if she is ever caught again. It is not well-known where they migrate to and from. Banding will continue through about Thanksgiving and volunteers are needed. I got to hold the owl and release it when we were done. It was so amazing. I may have to try to fit another evening in this year.