Tag Archives: Ninepipe NWR

Lost in Owls

As 2023 winds down, we hope you enjoy our penultimate post on one of everyone’s favorite subjects. Before that, we have some great news to share. Sneed’s picture book Border Crossings has received NCTE’s prestigious Orbis Pictus Award for nonfiction! This is one of the literary world’s top children’s book awards and was inspired by, you guessed it, Braden’s and Sneed’s birding adventures along the US Mexico border. Learn more and order by clicking here!

**Border Crossings—winner of the 2024 Orbis Pictus Award!**

Owls consistently rank among the favorite bird groups of birders, and Braden and I are no exceptions. We’ve had a pretty good year for owls in 2023. It got off to a roaring start with wonderful encounters with Long-eared Owls, Northern Pygmy-Owls, and Saw-whet Owls the first days of the year, and continued with the now-famous Northern Hawk-Owl in Wise River. Unfortunately, after that, our owl experiences stalled. We failed to see both Great Gray Owls and Snowy Owls last winter, nor even a Barred Owl. We also missed both Western and Eastern Screech Owls, though did pick up Burrowing Owls near Great Falls. When Braden got home from college a few days ago, however, we decided we would make one last effort to see perhaps our biggest miss of the year: Short-eared Owl.

**Short-eared Owls are one of our favorite Montana birds—but so far in 2023, they had totally skunked us!**

We had looked for Short-eareds multiple times in 2023, both at Ninepipe National Wildlife Refuge, and on our forays into eastern Montana. In fact, I had never gone to eastern Montana without seeing one of these spectacular creatures, but this year? Zip. Ditto at Ninepipe, where we can almost always count on at least one SEOW during the year. What was going on? Joni Mitchell’s prophetic lines haunted me:

“I’ve looked at owls from both sides now

From up and down, and still somehow

It’s owl illusions I recall

I guess I don’t know owls at all.”

Why does Joni always have to be so darned depressing? Nonetheless, when our neighbor Tim told me he’d been encountering gobs of Short-eared Owls while out hunting in the Mission Valley, Braden and I were determined to give SEOWs one last try. We parked at Tim’s spot amidst a winter wonderland of frosted fields created by low fog and freezing temperatures that have been blanketing the area for the past couple of weeks. A sign invited pedestrians into the property so unlike our other searches for SEOWs, which relied on driving rural roads for miles and miles, we zipped up our jackets, slung our optics over our shoulders, and followed a frozen dirt path out into a field.

Almost immediately, rodents (voles?) scurried in front of us while Northern Harriers circled the perimeter.

“There have got to be owls here,” I said. “Look at all this prey!”

Well, not so fast. We kept walking, expecting an owl to fly up at any moment, but no dice. We heard Canada Geese, saw magpies and a hawk or two, but no owl. As the road curved left, I decided to crunch my way over to a big group of cattails. As I paused to study it, I suddenly heard Braden shout, and spun around to see a Short-eared Owl quickly flying away!

**More often than not, we observe the rear end of a SEOW, and this one was no exception!**

For those who haven’t seen these creatures, they truly are marvels of engineering. While perched, they appear only medium-sized. Once they take off, they unfurl impossibly long, flexible wings that leave an observer breathless. Like Northern Harriers, which also hunt low over fields and marshes, listening for prey, Short-eared Owls hunt by both sight and sound, moving low and slow, their long wings giving them plenty of lift with minimal flapping. We watched, elated as this one flew in a lazy arc away from us—but it was so much fun to be out alone in the middle of this giant field that we decided to keep walking.

When a fence blocked our way, we turned right and followed an embankment along an irrigation ditch. Braden heard Marsh Wrens, and then we encountered another fence. I pride myself on having good directional sense, so I said, “Let’s head this way back toward the road.”

One advantage to the frozen ground is we could walk across normally wet places without plunging into cold water. We walked in parallel, forty or fifty feet apart, and at one point I saw Braden pause to study another group of cattails. He motioned me over, and I was stunned to see a white face with beady eyes pop out to look at me. A weasel! The mammal was in full winter “plumage,” and it was only the second one we’d ever seen in Montana, so it quickly grabbed “Bird of the Day” honors!

**This Short-tailed Weasel (we think) grabbed Bird of the Day honors as we searched for Short-eared Owls.**

But our owling, it turns out, had just begun. As we headed back toward our car, Short-eared Owls started popping up like jack-in-the-boxes! We tried to spot them on the ground so we could steer around them, but they were so well hidden in the grass and cattails that we never saw one until it took flight. Then we just stood in awe, watching it navigate on their incredible wings until they settled a couple of hundred meters away. One owl even had a little tête-à-tête with a Northern Harrier, exchanging some words neither Braden nor I could make out.

**I had the ISO of my camera cranked too high, so my owl shots are all grainy, but this photo still captures the magnificence of SEOWs.**

One thing we wondered was why the birds weren’t actively hunting. Prey scurried everywhere, and the cold air shouldn’t have been a problem for such masterful fliers. In fact, Braden and I have seen them active in all seasons and at all times of day, though they do tend to be crepuscular—most active at dawn and dusk—especially in winter. Beyond this, I am guessing that the birds were so stuffed with voles that they could afford to chill out—literally. (But see my earlier comments on my understanding of owls re: Joni Mitchell.)

After observing at least half a dozen of these glorious creatures, we finally made it back to the road. Alarmingly, our minivan had disappeared!

“Geez, where is it?” I asked. “Did someone tow it?”

“I don’t know.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “This road is paved. Didn’t we park on a dirt road?”

“Oh, yeah,” Braden confirmed.

So much for my infallible sense of direction! As we wandered across fields, we had veered at least 90-degrees off course and ended up in a totally different place than we’d intended. Fortunately, Braden was able to use our eBird track to quickly figure out where our car was actually located. After a short hike down the paved road, and a turn right, we reunited with our faithful birding-mobile.

Seeing one of our favorite birds was a great way to wrap up our Montana birding adventures for the year and made us feel good knowing that great habitat and plenty of food still abounded for this wonderful species. The weasel (probably a Short-tailed Weasel) was also a great bonus. The Short-eared Owl pushed my Montana Year Bird list to 252 species, my second highest total ever. That number would tick over to 253 species an hour later when Braden and I saw a Northern Shrike up near Polson. Braden’s 2023 Montana total reached 198—pretty darned good considering he spent only five or six weeks in the state. None of us can predict the future, but if we all keep getting out there, we can guarantee that 2024 will bring plenty more birding adventures. What are we all waiting for?

**Braden and I hope that 2024 brings you owls—and lots of other cool birds!**

From One Nemesis Bird to Another

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Before sharing my recent search for nemesis birds, a quick update on our last post, “Welcoming White-crowned Sparrows—with Observer Bias”. In the post, I discussed how the apparent abundance of White-crowned Sparrows coming through western Montana this year may have to do more with my birding effort than actual sparrow numbers. Well, after I published the post, several birders around the state shared that they also have been seeing unusually high numbers of White-crowneds. This greater “sample size” of observations leads me to believe that the birds might be having an exceptional year after all. Go White-crowneds! This last Monday, in fact, I saw another WCSP feeding with some American Goldfinches. Will it be my last observation of the season?

**There’s not many better things in life than birding in the Mission Valley on a glorious fall day—even when nemesis birds are eluding you!**

In recent posts, I have shared my foiled attempts at finding one of my biggest nemesis birds, Spruce Grouse. Here in Montana, I have started to become known as “The guy who’s never seen a Spruce Grouse.” It’s not my favorite moniker, but well, I am learning to live with it. To distract me from my shame, last week I decided to look for a different nemesis bird: American Golden-Plover.

Arguably one of America’s most stunning birds during breeding season, the AGPL has thwarted Braden and me here in Montana at least a dozen times. Every year, birders spot the plovers up in the Mission Valley north of us, and countless times we have saddled our trusty minivan and galloped up to Ninepipe National Wildlife Refuge or Pablo Reservoir—only to find no American Golden-Plovers in sight. Braden did finally find one in Maine a couple of years ago (see his post “A Montana Nemesis Bird in Maine”), but the arrival of 2023 still saw the absence of this marquis bird on my Life List, let alone my or Braden’s Montana lists. This has obviously caused us great pain and anguish, so when I saw that someone had observed six, count ‘em SIX, American Golden-Plovers up at Ninepipe last week, I had to seriously ask myself if I wanted to put myself through yet more misery.

My answer, with Braden’s encouragement: Yes.

**The second of two Peregrine Falcons I would see this day. Definitely PEFA migration season!**

As a result, last Thursday, I woke early, walked Lola, and then headed north on 93. My first stop? Ninepipe. I usually begin my explorations here with a drive down Duck Road, but today I was a man on a mission, so I entered at the bottom end of the refuge. Almost immediately, I spotted small shorebirds at the edge of a pond and pulled over to get out my spotting scope. Before I could get my eyes on them, though, a large dark shape swooped in and the shorebirds frantically flung themselves into the sky. Peregrine Falcon! my mind shouted as I excitedly watched the raptor give chase. The falcon and shorebirds circled the pond twice, but then fled toward the horizon. I had failed to get a look at the shorbs, but seeing a Peregrine was a thrilling start to the day!

**They weren’t the plovers I was looking for, but it’s always, ahem, great to see Greater Yellowlegs in Montana.**

After climbing back into the car, I continued to wind my way north, getting glances at Trumpeter Swans and several kinds of ducks. I also got great looks at a trio of American Pipits on the road. My major destination, though, was the dam on the west side of the main lake. There, I observed several Greater Yellowlegs and, driving a bit farther, a couple of other shorebirds on the muddy shore below. I quickly parked and began breaking out my spotting scope when a car pulled up containing yet another impressive trio: accomplished Montana birders Craig Hohenberger, Shawn Richmond, and Braydon Luikart! I had last met Craig all the way out in Westby this past summer so it was a nice surprise to see him here again now, and to chat with all of them.

“Are you the one who is trying to find the Spruce Grouse?” Shawn asked.

“Well, uh, yeah,” I sheepishly replied. “But today I’m looking for American Golden-Plovers.”

Shawn knows the Mission Valley like the back of her hand, and said, “They should be around.” She then gave me the name of a place she had seen them only in the past few days.

“Thanks,” I told her, “I’ll check that out.”

First, though, I wanted to scope the ground in front of me. To my surprise, the pair of shorebirds below me turned out to be Pectoral Sandpipers—Year Birds for me and, I suspect, what the Peregrine Falcon had been going after earlier. Again, though, no golden-plovers, so I packed up my scope and moved on.

**Still no golden-plovers, but it was great to see Pectoral Sandpipers for the first time this year.**

In a tradition Braden and I have followed since we began birding, I grabbed an egg biscuit at the McDonald’s in Ronan, and continued on to another well-known place for sighting AGPLs, Pablo Reservoir. Again, I began at the south end and slowly continued north on top of the dam. I was delighted to discover a pair of Baird’s Sandpipers scouring the shore in the company of half a dozen American Pipits. The gurgling calls of Sandhill Cranes ricocheted across the water as I looked out on hundreds of geese, ducks, gulls—and a lone American White Pelican. A dark shape perched on a little rock on the far mudflats, and I trained my scope on it with a strong suspicion. Yes! It was another Peregrine Falcon! I was definitely hitting migration season for those! As for the American Golden-Plovers???

Nada. Zilch. Klum.

**Though the golden-plovers again foiled me at Pablo Reservoir, I got my best look of the year at a couple of Baird’s Sandpipers!**

Normally, that would have been the end of my day—except for running into Shawn Richmond earlier. “I’m here,” I told myself. “I have plenty of iced tea. I might as well check out the spot she told me about.”

I punched up the location on Google Maps and it showed a 25-minute drive. Though an official hotspot, it definitely sat off the beaten path enough to receive fewer visitors. I parked behind an abandoned house of some sort and could see that viewing would be less than ideal. A lake lay several hundred meters away, but the near shore was obscured by vegetation while the far shore shimmered another couple of hundred meters beyond that. Nonetheless, even through my binoculars I could see that there were birds on that far shore. Even better, I felt pretty sure they were shorebirds!

I assembled my scope and began tromping across the field, hoping I wouldn’t scare any of the distant birds. I didn’t, but before I could get closer, a Northern Harrier did, and the birds on shore scattered before I had any hope of identifying them. I cursed at my luck, but then, amazingly . . . the birds came back! This spectacle, it turns out, would repeat itself quite a few times during my short visit.

**A Northern Harrier kept stirring up the shorebirds as I was trying to ID them. Don’t tell the shorebirds, but I think the harrier had its sights on other prey!**

I got my scope focused and picked out about a dozen each Greater Yellowlegs, Killdeer, and Pectoral Sandpipers—but they weren’t what got my heart beating. Among the other birds, I also saw three distinct shapes. Plover shapes. Large plover shapes. Zeroing in on them, I got even more excited. They definitely could be what I was looking for!

One problem with finding American Golden-Plovers is that in nonbreeding plumage, they are challenging to distinguish from Black-bellied Plovers. That’s not as much of a problem when Black-bellieds are in breeding plumage as they were here when Braden and I visited Benton Lake NWR near Great Falls last summer.

The problem is this: the plovers were not breeding males. Instead, they were in their much drabber juvenile or nonbreeding plumage, and that meant that they possibly could be either Black-bellied Plovers or American Golden-Plovers. I had seen nonbreeding Black-bellied Plovers several times—but didn’t have enough experience with them to say, “Those are NOT Black-bellied Plovers out there in front of me.” Still, thinking back on prior experiences, and studying my Sibley phone app, I had a hunch these might just be my nemesis Amercian Golden-Plovers. For one thing, their bodies and necks seemed slimmer than Black-bellied Plovers. They also gave off a kind of smooth, grayish sheen on their bellies whereas I remembered BBPLs as being whiter and more distinct.

**It looked like an American Golden-Plover, but was it??? I would have to wait to hear from Braden to be sure!**

Bottom line: I just wasn’t sure.

I took tons of lousy photos, and as soon as I got home, sent them to Braden. A couple of hours later, he called me from Maine. “Daddy!” he exclaimed. “You saw American Golden-Plovers!” We then proceeded to detail the various aspects of his ID. Not only was it a great learning process, it felt good to be able to share this nemesis sighting with my son from all the way across the continent. AGPL, finally, after many years, became my 301^st Montana Life Bird and the 997^th on my Life List.

I’ll bet you can guess what I hope number 998 will be!

Starting 2023 in the Dumps

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If you’ve been following our posts the past five years, you’ve probably learned that Braden and I like to kick off a new year with a big day of birding. Last year on January 1, we enjoyed an exceptional day, chalking up almost 50 species including Snowy, Short-eared, and Great Horned Owls. This year, we didn’t get out until January 3—and following a much colder snap of weather—and weren’t sure what we might find. I predicted we’d see 45 species while Braden opted for a more conservative 40. We both agreed, though, that we might be a bit optimistic.

We backed out of our driveway in total darkness and an hour later, as dawn spread over the horizon, were greeted by the sheer majesty of the snow-covered Mission Mountains, surely one of the most stunning mountain ranges in the Lower 48. Our first destination? Duck Road at Ninepipe, perhaps our most reliable spot for Short-eared Owls. Alas, these owls are not to be trusted. They had obviously received advanced intel about our arrival and skedaddled to some other part of the refuge. As we crept along in the early light, though, we spotted a flock of about sixty small birds suddenly rising up from the snow-covered grass. “Waxwings?” I asked as Braden quickly got his binoculars on them. I parked the car as he answered, “No. Guess again.” “Snow Buntings?” I asked excitedly. “Yes!”

Can you find the buntings? Even with the spotting scope, the rascals proved challenging to observe.

We watched the birds whirl around before landing again, and quickly broke out the spotting scope. Often, Snow Buntings travel with Lapland Longspurs, but as we scanned the birds feeding hungrily about a hundred yards away, we saw that this flock was pure buntings. Remarkably, these were the first Snow Buntings we’d ever seen on the west side of the mountains and it kicked off the day in fine fashion.

We left Ninepipe with only about ten species, but felt optimistic heading north, and sure enough, found a pair of gorgeous Long-eared Owls at a well-known spot near Polson, Montana. At a nearby bakery, we also happened to snag two donuts and a cinnamon roll for our Year List. Yum!

**Bird of the Day: Even concealed in this thicket, this Long-eared Owl and its companion gave us our best-ever look at these animals in the wild.**

We weren’t sure what we were going to do next, but decided to retrace last year’s route and continue on to Kalispell in hopes of finding a Snowy Owl. Last year, we had happened into an amazing group of waterfowl at the north end of the lake, but this year we ran into a much smaller group about halfway up the west side of Flathead at Dayton Bay. Here we found Trumpeter Swans and six kinds of ducks, and it was a good thing as we discovered that the north end of the lake was almost completely frozen.

After an unsuccessful search for Snowy Owls, we stopped at Panera’s for lunch and contemplated our next move. “We could go to the Kalispell dump,” Braden suggested. I cringed at the idea since we’d been yelled at a couple of years before when trying to go there to find gulls and Gray-crowned Rosy-finches. The trick was to arrive with some trash to throw away, but we’d forgotten to bring any. As we munched away on our Kitchen Sink cookies, however, we formulated a plan. After leaving Panera’s I drove behind some of the big box stores nearby and, sure enough, found some wasted cardboard sitting there. I tossed it into our trusty minivan and we were all set!

Alas, we found nothing truly extraordinary at the landfill. We did pick up Herring Gulls, which can be a bit tricky to locate in Montana, but the real surprise was a group of about ten turkeys feeding on garbage. Hm. “I didn’t know they could do that,” Braden said, but it made sense. After all, the amount of food Americans throw away could easily feed several other countries. Though we failed to find anything really rare, we had completed our covert mission and headed south again feeling like we’d done our best. Click here for our dump checklist!

Who knew that Wild Turkeys liked to forage in landfills? We didn’t get any photos of this happening since we had to get in and out of the dump quickly, but thought you’d enjoy this “non-landfill” turkey—a different subspecies than the Landfill Turkey.

As the day again drifted toward darkness, we again hit Ninepipe on our way back to Missoula, picking up American Kestrels, a Northern Harrier, and a couple of large groups of pheasants, but no Short-eared Owls. As a consolation prize, though, as soon as we got home, Braden heard Great Horned Owls hooting from our front porch and called me out to listen. We ended the day with 35 species, undershooting even Braden’s smaller target, but felt good about the day. It was still a respectable number to start the new year, and with Braden heading back to college soon, we both cherished another day getting to bird together. How can you do better than that?

The Good ‘Ole College Try: As our first 2023 day of birding wound down, Braden trudged off across this field to determine if perhaps any Short-eared Owls were just laying low. They weren’t. Still, we felt pleased by our first day of birding, 2023.

A New Year’s Triple-Shot of Owls

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Still on the fence about subscribing? Kick off the New Year right and go for it. We won’t share your info or use it for any nefarious purposes. We promise! Just fill out the box down and to the right.

You PhD students of FatherSonBirding may recall that our debut post related to our very first Snowy Owl sighting on March 9, 2018, almost four years and 100+ posts ago. Today’s post marks a return to our roots—sort of.

After a successful birding trip to Oregon to close out 2021, Braden and I decided to kick off 2022 with a modest New Year’s Day tour of Ninepipe National Wildlife Refuge in the vain hope that we might see a Short-eared Owl, a species that totally eluded us last year and is one of our favorite birds. As we headed north in our trusty minivan, however, a crooked nail of a thought kept scratching at my brain. Finally, as we approached St. Ignatius I glanced at Braden and said, “You know, people eBirded the Snowy Owl again yesterday, and this might be our last chance to see it together before you head back to college. What do you think?”

“I’m in,” he answered, “but let’s hit Duck Road first.”

I exhaled, relieved. Even though it would mean an extra two hours of driving, now we were committed. We quickly hit Duck Road at Ninepipe looking for Short-eareds, and of course got skunked, though we did get a great look at a hunting Prairie Falcon and flushed a Great Horned Owl that had taken up residence in a small tree. Then, we high-tailed it toward Kalispell, stopping only for an unsuccessful attempt to find a Lifer Glaucous Gull at Somers Bay.

This Great-horned has apparently taken up residence in a new tree. Don’t be surprised to see it your next time on Duck Road. (Water tower of Charlo in the background—don’t you love telephoto lenses?)

Turning left onto Farm Road in Kalispell—er, Somers to be exact—dark clouds of failure haunted me. After all, we had scoured this neighborhood for four hours in 2021 without so much as a glimpse of a Snowy Owl (see our post “Payin’ Raptor Dues, Reapin’ Raptor Rewards”) and as we crept slowly forward, it felt like history would repeat itself as we passed one owl-less roof and field after another . We turned left on Manning Road and continued driving, stopping a couple of times to scan every house in sight. “I’ve got Collared Doves,” Braden said, just as I focused in on a fuzzy white lump on a roof.

“Got it,” I said. Braden said, “Good,” thinking I was referring to the Collared Doves. “No, I mean the owl,” I clarified. And indeed, only ten minutes after beginning our search, there it was—no more than a quarter mile from where we’d seen our first Snowy in 2018! As beautiful as Snowy Owls are, they don’t usually do a whole lot, but we enjoyed staring at it for ten minutes and taking lousy photos. We thanked the owl and then, with a whole afternoon suddenly freed up, began birding our way back home.

**Okay, not the best photo, but give me a break already. The Snowy was far away!**

We hit numerous spots on our way south, picking up one Year Bird after another. One of the great things about birding on New Year’s is that it resets the birding calendar, making every new bird a Year Bird! In fact, perhaps because of our low expectations, we saw almost everything we could wish for: Common Redpolls, American Tree Sparrow, half a dozen ducks, and an unlikely Double-crested Cormorant. As we once again approached Ninepipe, we had plenty of daylight for a second go at Short-eared Owls. We again bombed on Duck Road so made our way around the fringes of the refuge, ending up on Ninepipe Lane. Suddenly, a large bird leaped into the air.

**I’ve never been able to take sharp in-flight photos, but I just love this image as this Short-eared Owl looks and listens for prey.**

“Short-eared!” Braden shouted. Yes! We got a beautiful look at the amazing creature as it flew a couple of circuits around us and then dove on a hapless mammal in a snowy field. Even more amazing, in the next mile we saw four more Short-eareds! They all perched at a fair distance, but we didn’t mind. In fact, we were glad that we wouldn’t be disturbing them by driving close. Not surprisingly, the SEOWs swooped in for Bird of the Day honors, but we had more birding pleasures in store—including Cedar and Bohemian Waxwings, a Great Blue Heron and kingfisher, a Northern Shrike, and right in our own neighborhood, our last bird of the day, Wild Turkey. It was an awesome way to kick off 2022, and with 46 species under our belts, by far our best Montana New Year’s Day birding experience ever—one we will treasure as Braden prepares to return to college in Maine.

Payin’ Raptor Dues, Reapin’ Raptor Rewards

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Gamblers and fishermen are famous for being superstitious. Birders aren’t much better. Sure, we feed ourselves platitudes such as, “The more you get out, the more you’ll see,” but deep down, we know that the birding gods control our fates, and that our success depends on whether we’re deemed worthy. In our last post, I recounted how Braden and I spent six hours and two days looking for a Gyrfalcon near White Sulpher Springs, only to endure the gods’ wrath. Yesterday morning, when we set out on a quest for a Snowy Owl, we wondered if the gods would continue to scorn us, or whether we had proven ourselves humble and dedicated enough to curry their birdly favor.

**Northern Harriers and other raptors were abundant wherever we looked. They, unfortunately, were not the birds we set out to see!**

We left the house at 6:30 a.m. and by 7:30 were at Ninepipe National Widlife Refuge, where we hoped to score an elusive Year Bird, Short-eared Owl. We drove the dirt roads for more than an hour and saw more than a dozen Red-tailed Hawks, Rough-leggeds, Bald Eagles, Harriers—even a Merlin. No Short-eared Owl. “Ah, well,” I told Braden. “We’ll get ‘em next time.” Inside, though, I was thinking, “Oh, man. Is it going to be that kind of day? Again?”

Well, apparently, it was. Reaching the Snowy Owl neighborhood near Kalispell, we again drove for more than an hour without so much of a glimpse of a white owl. By now, I realized that the BGs must be really pissed at us. We decided to chase some other birds and come back later, however, and did score our first Gray-crowned Rosy-finches in three years at the Kalispell dump—while getting bawled out by the “dump lady” for our efforts. We also found a White-winged Crossbill among a flock of Red Crossbills feeding on some nearby spruce trees. Nice, but not a Snowy Owl.

**Mallards are no doubt the most underrated duck, but this flock of five thousand birds made a big impression on Braden and me!**

After a lunch at Panera Bread (hey, more chicken in my Napa Almond Chicken Salad Sandwich, please!), including our favorite kitchen sink cookies, we hit an amazing field full of about 5,000 Mallards. Stunning! Then, we returned to the Snowy Owl site, where we encountered several other birders. None of them had had any success, either, but while we were commiserating, a photographer named Dick Walker introduced himself and asked, “Are you the father-son birding team?” We’d never been called that, but I answered “Yes,” and he started talking about the Mallard spot we’d just left. He showed us photos of Lapland Longspurs and, most exciting, a Gyrfalcon he had seen only thirty minutes before!

We tore back to the place, forever hopeful. No longspurs. No falcon. After fifteen minutes, though, a massive group of a thousand Mallards lifted off and seconds later, a sleek, jet-fighter shape zoomed across our field of vision. “It’s the Gyr!” Braden shouted.

**Our first Gyr was a darker bird and left no doubt it was master of the skies. We’ll never forget it!**

Indeed it was. We quickly lost it in the distance and decided to race over to another road closer to where it disappeared. We got there and jumped out of the car just as the amazing raptor reappeared, obviously enjoying terrifying the thousands of ducks and geese swirling around it. While Braden set up our scope, I tracked the bird with my binoculars. It seemed to toy with a large group of ducks, but its madness had some method as more and more Mallards peeled off until only two remained. As I watched, breathless, the Gyr hit one of them and took it to the ground. “It got a duck!” I shouted.

**I was astounded how quickly this Baldie swooped in to steal the Gyr’s kill. It made me wonder how many ducks the falcon has to kill before it actually gets to eat one!**

Its victory was temporary. Within thirty seconds, a much larger brown shape swooped in—an immature Bald Eagle. It effortlessly drove the Gyr from its kill, eliciting shouts of outrage from yours truly. We continued watching the amazing creature for another fifteen minutes before it vanished again. Then, after another unsuccessful Snowy Owl circuit, we began the long drive home. As we headed south along Flathead Lake, I thought about BB King, who often talked about paying his dues, and asked myself why we’d seen a Gyrfalcon here, in the last place we’d ever expected. “Maybe our efforts in White Sulphur Springs satisfied the birding gods after all,” I speculated. “Or maybe we just had to pay our birding dues to see the Gyr.” Either way, it had been one of the best birding days Braden and I had ever experienced—even without the Snowy Owl.