December 2019 – Wildlife In Nature

Short-eared Owl

Posted on December 25, 2019 by Gary R. Soper

December 23, 2019 – It’s the most wonderful time of the year, that time when winters’ late afternoon skies become active with Short-eared owls swooping, gliding, or perched on a fence post or in a small leafless tree just above the tall grasses of their winter roost. Early mornings and overcast days are also good times to see the owls. Where suitable habitat exists on the restored prairies or along the rural roads of Northeastern Illinois and Northwestern Indiana during those cold winter months, it is during the late afternoon, as the sun retreats towards the southwest, when those delightful medium-sized owls take to the sky in amazing displays of flight. When not chasing each other, in their minor territorial disputes, they search the fields and prairies for prey, occasionally landing on the ground highly alert and watching the other owls flying above. When “The Prairie State” was truly a prairie, before settlements and agriculture claimed the land, the nesting of Short-eared owls was believed to be widespread and numerous on the unbroken grasslands of Illinois and Indiana. Now there are only a few places suitable for nesting in Illinois. Prairie Ridge State Natural Area in Jasper County is one of those areas and it provides 2000 acres of grassland habitat for these ground nesting owls to roost, hunt, and fledge their young. It should also be mentioned that the 2000 acres at Prairie Ridge has nesting Northern harriers and the states only population of Greater prairie chickens. Closer to home, just east of Kankakee, the 8,400 acres of restored prairie and wetlands owned and managed by the Indiana Chapter of the Nature Conservancy at the Kankakee Sands in Newton County Indiana is a great place to observe wintering Short-eared owls, Harriers, and Rough-legged hawks.

Short-eared owl gliding over the prairie looking for prey this past week.

The Northern Harrier

Posted on December 25, 2019 by Gary R. Soper

A hunting Northern Harrier spreads its’ tail-feathers slowing down quickly to catch the prey below.

December 19, 2019 – Gliding low and slow across the agricultural fields and the grassy waterways and prairies here in Northeastern Illinois are the beautiful Northern harriers. Once known as the Marsh hawk, these steep banking, quick stopping, hunting birds are considered here in the United States as “resident to long-distance migrants” According to the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. We see an increase in numbers during the fall migration and into the winter months throughout Illinois. The harriers nest in numbers from Northern Wisconsin north into Canada and Alaska. These ground nesting hawks require large amounts of grasslands or wetland habitats for successful nesting. Some of the harriers winter from just south of the southern edge of their summer range, while others migrate all the way south to Central and South America. The stealthy, medium-sized hawks can be seen flying and hunting across Illinois’s cold sleeping landscape, looking and listening for movement coming from the dried dormant grasses just beneath their silent glide. When the focused hunters detect prey they use their long wings and long tail feathers to quickly turn and stop their graceful forward movement and instantly drop down on a field mouse or vole. The harriers are often seen diving at and chasing away Rough-legged hawks, Red-tailed hawks and even other harriers that get too close to their perceived hunting areas. The Northern Harriers are easily identified as they fly low across fields and prairies, their wings most often in a v-shape, and there is a white rump patch at the top of their long tail feathers. The female harriers and the immature birds are dark reddish-brown and tan, and the male adult birds, slightly smaller than the female, are a light-gray and almost white on some parts of the body, the tips of their wings are black. Often perched on a fence post or sitting in a field with a captured prey, one can get a good look at the feather pattern on the harrier’s face, it has a round appearance and resembles that of an owl. The disk like pattern of feathers on the harriers face is believed to help the hawks hear their prey as they hunt.

An adult female Northern Harrier keeps a wary eye as it glides by the photographer.

The Ring-necked Pheasant

Posted on December 13, 2019 by Gary R. Soper

A male Ring-necked pheasant gives a broadside look a those glorious tail feathers.

December 12, 2019 – Four fine-looking multicolored male Ring-necked pheasants cautiously search the ground for seeds and insects, pecking with their pale-yellow curved beaks at the low grasses and dried leaves, along the edge of thick cover, this past week in Iroquois county. The elaborate flashy birds could be heard vocalizing, much like farmyard fowl, as they nervously moved away from the photographer. The male pheasants, commonly called roosters, have some spectacular colors with long, elegant tail feathers. The females or hens, however, have shorter tail feathers and are well camouflaged for nesting and caring for their brood. The Ring-necked pheasant was introduced to the United States in Oregon in 1882, after several attempts at releasing the exotic birds into the wilds of the northwest were needed. Eventually the transplants were successful and began to take hold. The introduction of the Ring-necked pheasants continued across the county. Over many years the pheasants have been a common sight and a popular upland game bird for hunters in and around the grassland and agricultural fields here in northern Illinois. The removal of hedge-rows along with the clearing of small stands of timber and brushy areas has taken away the needed habitat for the pheasants and native wildlife alike. The wholesale clearing of habitat has made the pheasants vulnerable. Sightings of pheasants have been less common in areas where the habitat has disappeared. The grasslands and brushy idle areas provide cover from predators and the sometimes harsh weather conditions here in the Midwest. Wet springs with flooding have a negative impact on nesting birds, likewise the exposure to heavy snows and sub temperatures can be hard on the birds when they can’t find cover for refuge. Fortunately for these celebrated game birds efforts by conservation groups, sportsman, and land owners working together to provide and restore habitat needed by the pheasants seems to be a successful and an ongoing desire that benefits native wildlife as well. An slight uptick in reported sightings recently here in northeastern Illinois seems to tell an encouraging story for the Ring-necked pheasant.

Four Roosters swiftly walk away as one bird keeps a wary eye towards the rear.

Snowy Owl

Posted on December 8, 2019 by Gary R. Soper

December 5, 2019 -Recently, on the 18th of November, the people of Barrow Alaska, at a latitude of 71º north, got their last glimpse of the Sun until late January 2020. Over these next few months, winters’ frigid grip will take hold in the extreme for the people and the wildlife above the arctic circle. Those high latitudes will become a dim world of unforgiving temperatures, short days, civil twilight, and darkness. One feathery inhabitant of the north is the Snowy owl, also known as the Snow owl, Arctic owl, and Ukpik in the Inukitut language of the Inuit people that live north of the tree line. Many of these beautiful white owls will move south off of their summer nesting range for the winter, but not all. According to Project Snow Storm, an ongoing research project into the yearly movements of Snowy owls, some of the owls actually move further north onto the Arctic sea ice to hunt through the winter. The second largest and heaviest owl in North America, the Snowy owl lives and breeds on the arctic tundra and spends the winter over a wide range from the interior and southern coastline of Alaska, across the Northwest Territories, most of Canada and south into the northern two-thirds of the United State including the flat agricultural land of Illinois. Some years, here in Illinois, higher numbers of Snowy owls are recorded, a phenomenon known as irruptions. Those record years of snowy invasions average every four or five years with the so called mega-irruptions bringing more owls further south then normal. I usually record a few Snowy owls in our area each year, but last year, 2017-18, I recorded seven and of course many other areas of Illinois saw an increase. Research has proven that an increase in prey animals like lemmings and voles on the breeding grounds of Snowy owls also insures the possibility of a successful nesting season. Irruption years of these white raptors spreading southward from their breeding range in the land of the midnight sun is always exciting and increases the chance encounter to actually witness this large white owl hunting over the croplands of Illinois.