With huge thanks to my photographer friend Steve (SJT Photography) for giving me a bird-alert Wednesday night, two miles from my home we have been given the rare and awesome opportunity to see and photograph a Snowy Owl! She has been perching on top of the Narrows Point Townhouses, adjacent to Mears Point Marina, for a couple days now.
Snowy Owls spend summers far north of the Arctic Circle hunting lemmings, ptarmigan, and other prey in 24-hour daylight. Some years, North American Snowy Owls may remain on their breeding grounds year-round, while others migrate in winter to southern Canada and the northern half of the contiguous United States. In the northern plains, New York, and New England, Snowy Owls occur regularly in winter. Elsewhere, such as here in the Mid-Atlantic, the Pacific Northwest, the Midwest, and eastern Canada, Snowy Owls may appear only in some winters but not in others.
I was able see our visiting Snowy Owl, which that in itself was such a thrill to me! When I arrived at the marina, it was easy to find the best spot to view. Birders with binoculars & scopes and bird photographers were all packed on a small corner of the marina’s second floor balcony. Everyone was chatting excitedly and very cordial in allowing me to get up front. 🙂 I was told by the group it was a young female.
The distance was a lot for my 70-200mm with 1.7x teleconverter, but I am thrilled that I did get these photos just to have for my catalog and share.
Here’s my full frame photo with no crop. She was still so far!
I was given the opportunity to view through a couple of the HUGE pro lens, and WOW! I was so jealous, I had the smallest lens there…..lol.
The Snowy Owl was in two locations, and I used three different locations during my three short visits. Here’s three of my photos cropped best I could without giving up too much on quality.
Next is the same photo cropped some more…..you can see her yellow eyes!
She was gorgeous even from afar!
I could not make it over today until late afternoon to find a lone photographer hanging out, scanning the whole area with his binoculars, so I didn’t stop. I hope to get a chance tomorrow to see if the Snowy Owl is still around. It is, of course, unknown how long she may stay; so if you live in the area, try to slip over to Mears Point Marina and just look for the group of people with cameras. They’ll show you where she is if she’s still here!
