We Named Her "Columbia"

Dec. 2, 2020 update: Columbia is back in the US! Her latest recorded location (with a 3 day delay) is in North Dakota. Track Columbia's movements and progress here.

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Snowy owls make their way to our neck of the prairie each winter. Some years we host a half-dozen or more, while others it can be tricky to find just one. This year, the snowys have been pretty darn elusive, but we have good news on that front!

This lift-off was caught on camera on Dec. 11 near Goose Pond. Birdwatchers were hopeful that we’d get to meet this snowy owl again! Photo by Arlene Koziol

The Project

We are close partners with Project SNOWstorm, which is a non-profit organization that studies snowy owls’ ecology and migration each year (Dave Brinker, co-founder and Wisconsin native, will give a presentation for Madison Audubon on April 21 — plan to attend!). They do this by outfitting owls with GPS transmitters that collect data on their location regularly. Those data upload to the database whenever the transmitter has reception, or stores the data until the owl “has service” again (a handy feature when most of the year the owl is in the Arctic!). The transmitters are feather-light, solar powered, and do not impact the owls’ flight or behavior.

We have successfully caught and outfitted two snowy owls in the past — Goose Pond in 2015 and Arlington in 2018. In addition, we caught and weighed Quarry in 2018 at the same time as Arlington (but we had only 1 transmitter). Finally, a snowy that was caught in central Wisconsin used one of our previous transmitters making Coddington in 2019 our third outfitted owl.

The Lead-up

On December 11th, Mike Bertram, UW Arlington Research Station Manager reported the first snowy owl sighting for the winter on Badger Lane at the station.

On January 16th, owl volunteers assembled with high hopes of locating and trapping at least one and maybe two snowy owls.  Lowell Wright, Noise/Environmental Officer with Dane County Regional Airport, set up trapping operations at the airport where there were two snowys residing, but he had no luck catching them that night.

On the same evening, Gene Jacobs set up his traps on Ramsey Road at the Otteson family residence near Highway 51.  Steve Otteson had reported that for the past week a snowy owl had been seen perched on the electric pole at the corner of their yard in late afternoon.  This owl was probably the 1.5 year-old female that first showed up on December 11th. Snowy owls like the openness of the Ramsey Road area.

The owl searchers drove a large area before and during the trapping operation and only found three short-eared owls. People were disappointed that the snowy did not appear that night, especially because Richard Armstrong stated that he’d “bet $100 we that we would see the owl.”

On January 20th, three snowy owls were reported at the Dane County airport and some of us thought that the owl on Ramsey Road was now  at the airport. However, on January 24th, our neighbor Judi Benade, sent us an email titled "Owl" along with a photo of the bird and this comment "Still owls around ... this one on Kampen Rd on the 4th phone pole west of County I."   This pole is near the northwest corner of Browne Prairie.

This unexpected snowy owl gift was a good omen on Jan. 28! Photo by Stacy Taritas

Today’s the Day

The owl was also seen on the 26th and 27th in the same area so plans were made to trap on the 28th. Stacy sent us this image on the morning of the 28th with this caption, “When my first grade student gifted me this snowy owl this morning, I of course hoped it was a sign that today is the day.”

Searchers again worked in vain before Gene arrived.  With no owls spotted in our area Gene and all our volunteers headed to the airport except for Mark and Fred Dike who continued searching for the owl around Goose Pond.  Vice President Pence was in Madison that day and Lowell informed us that we could not drive around the airport area searching for owls until the the Vice President left. 

Arlys and Curt Caslavka and Dennis Schenborn were a search  team. Arlys wrote,

“After two hours of searching at Goose Pond and the airport with only seeing the owl at the airport that we couldn’t try and trap, it was exciting to get the call that a snowy had been spotted on an electric pole near Goose Pond. The site was perfect for setting up the caged live pigeon about 60 yards from the pole. The snares made of fishing line on top of the cage were easily visible from where we sat. 

And then the tense waiting.  Five cars facing the space between the owl and the cage lined up like at an outdoor movie…for 30 minutes. Was she hungry? Interested in the pigeon? Too smart for us? Waiting for dark?  At 5:07 p.m. she swooped down and landed near the cage. And for about eight minutes she hopped, walked, bounced, and danced around the cage. She puffed up her feathers and lifted her wings to move close in and out, looking in all directions, obviously cautious and assessing the situation.  We didn’t want to blink for fear of missing something. Suddenly she leaped up above the cage and began flapping as the snare caught hold of her, but only by a single toe. In a second, Gene and Richard Armstrong were out of the car and heading up the hill to the trap. A minute later the owl was freed, calmed, and safe heading back in Gene’s arms. What a beautiful owl and what a heart-thumping experience this was. Lucky us!”

The beautiful snowy owl caught near Goose Pond Sanctuary on Jan. 28, 2020. She was outfitted with a transmitter for research purposes and release back into the wild. Photo by Monica Hall

Everyone returned to the Kampen Road residence to the laundry room to help process, photograph, and observe the banding and attachment of the transmitter.  After processing the owl she was released at the capture location by Graham Steinhauer. Everyone wished her good luck.  

Gene Jacobs examins the snowy owl to determine her age. Photo by Dennis Schenborn

Meet Columbia

The marvelous snowy owl weighed a hefty five and a quarter pounds. Later Gene examined wing photos and found that she was the same 1.5 year old that Arlene photographed on December 11th. Project SNOWstorm likes to name owls after a location. Our first owl an adult male caught on February 13, 2015 was named Goose Pond. Arlington, a juvenile male, was our second owl so Sue said “Let’s name her Columbia.” Thanks to everyone that has provided us with owl sightings, photographs, and assisted with searching and trapping. 

Third time’s a charm?

After Arlington passed away in 2018, his transmitter was recovered, refurbished, and placed on Cottington, an adult male, in 2019 at the Buena Vista Marsh southwest of Stevens Point.  Unfortunately Cottington ended up getting covered by manure at a farm and had to enter rehab. He was cleaned up and released without the transmitter. So Arlington’s transmitter was placed on Columbia making this the fourth Madison Audubon owl of Project SNOWstorm’s 100 owls.  We wish Columbia well on her journey to the arctic and hope that she helps researchers learn more about snowy owl ecology and also provides an educational opportunity for the public to appreciate these magnificent animals.

Leslie, a mother of two children and a grade school teacher wrote the following note after her visit with the kids the day before Columbia was caught. 

“On Monday afternoon my children Wally (7) and Cece (5) and I set out to explore Goose Pond for a great outdoor winter adventure looking for snowy owls. We'd been following the pictures and stories about the snowys on the Madison Audubon Facebook page and tracking the owls on Project Snowstorm for the past few winters. We LOVE snowy owls at our house, so we came prepared! We brought our three stuffed animal owls - 2 snowys and their friend, the barn owl.  

We were very fortunate to encounter Mark & Graham in the first few minutes of our search. In fact, we hadn't even gotten out of the car when they found us and lead us to a nearby area where they had just recently seen the bird we now know as Columbia. We could hardly contain our excitement at having found some guides who might lead us to see the snowy ourselves. When we pulled into a driveway, we could see the snowy owl right at the top of the hill. We were absolutely thrilled. This was a huge highlight of 2020 thus far! We stayed probably 45 minutes and watched the bird through binoculars. The kids squealed with delight when it seemed as if Columbia looked right at them! Watching the snowy owl fly was incredible for all of us, too. Just stunning. The following day in school, Wally was inspired to write a story about snowy owls here in Wisconsin and teach his classmates all we know about the snowys.

Columbia sits and waits for supper (taken on Dec. 11, 2019). Photo by Arlene Koziol

What a treat! Thanks so much to Madison Audubon for your incredible work. And special thanks to our tour guides on this special day! We'll not forget it and we'll look forward to tracking Columbia and to more adventures in the beautiful Goose Pond area.”

Within a week or so, anyone will be able to track Columbia’s whereabouts on the Project SNOWstorm website. The project protects the birds by delaying the release of locations by 3 days, so keep that in mind as you watch her move around Wisconsin and eventually up to the Arctic.

Bon voyage, Columbia!

By Mark Martin and Susan Foote-Martin, Goose Pond Sanctuary resident managers, goosep@madisonaudubon.org