Best of birding, January 2024
January was not a very active birding month for me. After the excitement of chasing (and finding) a lifer Cape May Warbler in addition to a bunch of other cool birds on New Year's Eve, January was extremely quiet, and I only kept three eBird lists for the whole month.
I did go out and "try" to find calling Northern Saw-whet Owls a couple times. "Try" in quotes because I was restricted by weather, sunset times, and access regulations at the places I went and listened. And tended to be limited to an hour of trying at most. Owls can be tough because this time of year I just want to be at home after dark, and I definitely am not interested at this point in my life in getting up at 3 and 4AM to be out for the "early shift."
I was able to make a dedicated effort to go locate some Short-eared Owls that have taken up in the countryside outside of LaSalle one weekend. When my wife and I pulled up along the county road where they've been seen five owls were already out hunting, scrapping with each other over the territory, and harassing neighboring Red-tailed Hawks and Northern Harriers. We watched them until it was almost dark. Of the owls I've seen, they were the most entertaining to watch, and I even captured some semi-decent photos of them despite the distance and lighting conditions.
