Monthly Archives: November 2011

Big year for snowy owls?

Posted on by
Reply

It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas for area birdwatchers who like seeing snowy owls. There’s been an influx of the tundra-dwelling birds, and chances are good that more are on the way.

Heidi Hughes, manager of the Audubon Center near Warren, Minn., photographed this snowy owl Nov. 23 near Warren.

It’s a marked change from last year, when snowy owls were scarce in the Red River Valley.

I’ve already seen two snowy owls, including a bird I spotted Thanksgiving Day along Roseau County Road 3 north of Badger, Minn.

Heidi Hughes, manager of the Audubon Center in Warren, Minn., said three snowy owls have been spotted near Warren this month, along with other sightings near Oklee, Red Lake Falls, Viking and Thief River Falls.

Owls are an “irruptive” species that venture into the lower 48 states when rodent populations crash farther north, Hughes said, along with years after a successful breeding season.

“Some snowies are present in the Red River Valley nearly every winter,” Hughes said in a news release. “But this could be a big year for them.”

Hughes is trying to keep track of snowy owl sightings, and is asking anyone who spots one of the birds to contact her at (218) 745-5663 or by email at agassizaudubon@gmail.com.

Injured eagle rescued in East Grand Forks

Posted on by
1

This afternoon took an interesting twist when I received a call from Bruce Nelson of East Grand Forks about an injured bald eagle that had been spotted in a neighborhood on Ninth Street Southeast.

He was wondering if I knew who to call about rescuing the bird.

I tried a couple of conservation officers but didn’t get an answer.

Long story short, a resident of the neighborhood, which is next to a dike along the Red Lake River, tracked down the phone number for the Raptor Center in St. Paul. A representative from the Raptor Center, in turn, contacted Tim Driscoll of Grand Forks. A local raptor authority, Driscoll is director of the Urban Raptor Research Project in Grand Forks.

Grand Forks raptor expert Tim Driscoll holds the bald eagle he rescued Tuesday afternoon along the Red Lake River in East Grand Forks. The eagle, which had a broken right wing, will be transferred to the Raptor Center in St. Paul.

It took a couple of tries, but Driscoll and Rick Galstad of East Grand Forks managed to subdue the bird, which had a broken right wing. Galstad is a chiropractor in East Grand Forks, and he spotted the eagle in a neighbor’s yard when he went home for lunch.

Sent to cover the story, I even got in on the chase.

Driscoll was able to wrap the eagle’s wing and will transport the bird Wednesday to a veterinarian in Fargo. From there, it will be transferred to the Raptor Center in St. Paul.

While the wing bone was snapped, Driscoll said the fact it wasn’t broken at the joint should improve the eagle’s recovery prospects. At worst, he said, the eagle would likely be transferred to a zoo.

To read more about the rescue, go to GrandForksHerald.com or check out Wednesday’s edition of the paper.

I’ll keep you posted on the big bird’s recovery.

Fooled by a fake crappie

Posted on by
Reply

I got fooled Saturday afternoon when Loren Keizer, a friend from Detroit Lakes, Minn., texted me a photo of Bruce Mosher holding a slab crappie on what appeared to be a sheet of ice.

As the story went, they were fishing an unnamed lake where the ice was 1½ inches thick.

Bruce Mosher of Beltrami, Minn., uses this metal crappie as part of the display promoting his Ice Buster bobbers. The fish looks just like the real deal.

Mosher, of Beltrami, Minn., is the inventor of the Ice Buster Bobber, and I’ve fished with him several times over the years. I also know him as a bit of a risk-taker, and it wouldn’t have surprised me if he’d actually ventured out on 1½ inches of ice.

I once fished with Mosher and Dave Genz – “aka Mr. Ice Fishing” – on a small lake in Polk County that had 2 inches of ice. I’ll never forget the horrible sounds the ice made if we got within 50 feet of each other.

There were no mishaps that late November afternoon, but it was an exercise in folly I’ll never repeat.

So, when I received Keizer’s photo of Mosher holding a crappie Saturday afternoon, I texted back and told him to tell Mosher he was crazy.

Long story short, the pair was at an ice fishing show in Sioux Falls, S.D., and they’d staged the photo in a snow-covered parking lot. On the small screen of my cell phone, at least, the white surface looked just like a sheet of ice.

And the crappie, a metal fish Mosher uses as part of his bobber display, looked just like the real deal.

“Bruce had that crappie in his display, and we were talking about early ice,” Keizer texted later. “He told me you would call him crazy.”

He was right; that’s exactly what I called him.

If this cold weather holds,  it won’t be long before anglers will be venturing out on the ice of smaller lakes. Be careful and play it safe, though. Go out with a buddy, wear a life jacket, carry a spud bar to test the ice (if it breaks through, hightail it back to shore), bring a rope and carry a set of ice picks just in case. A minimum of 4 inches of ice is recommended for safe foot travel.