The Great Grey Owl

    For about three years I've been hearing about and seeing images of Great Grey Owls that have been spotted west of Cochrane and south of Water Valley. The Great Grey Owl is the largest owl in North America and the second largest in the world making them an impressive specimen. Coupled with the fact that I have never seen one other than the one in the Calgary Zoo I was determined to get pictures of one.  For as long as I'd been hearing they were in the area we've driven the backroads in search of them with no luck. But today we finally found one.
    As we rounded a corner in the road he swooped across the field to our right and landed in a tree, with a nearly five foot wingspan it would have been nearly impossible to not see him. I took a few shots out the window of car but he was a little too far off to get any great shots. Knowing that these owls are fairly tolerant of people and will just fly off if they feel uncomfortable I decided to try getting a little closer. Luckily this owl was one of the tolerant ones and let me get very close without any concern that I was there. I spent about 5 minutes taking pictures of him while he went about his day with little concern I was there, then left him alone and headed back to the car. We didn't see anything the rest of trip and that was perfectly fine with me.


Click on the picture to the right or the "Latest Images" button to see the rest of the pictures from yesterday.

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