Great Gray Owl in early morning light

From my archives! I still have many old photos of Great Gray Owls that have not been posted and, as I'm just not getting the chance to "get out there" to look, thought I'd grab a shot from my archives. This shot was taken on a day that I actually got up and left the house really early - maybe the only day I've ever done that, when going somewhere on my own?

Getting up really early is always so hard for me to do. I'm a night owl with atrocious sleep habits, so getting out of bed at 5:00 a.m. (alarm was set for 4:15 a.m., though!) was not my favourite way to start the day on 28 March 2013. Funny, when I have to meet friends for various early-starting trips, I can do it (but don't like it), but when I go off on my own, there is no deadline to meet, and I just never get round to doing it.

I headed NW of the city, wanting to see if time of day made any, or much, difference to seeing wildlife. Who really knows? I have seen these beautiful birds of prey at all sorts of times of the day, but of course the light was different. This one must have plunged into the mix of dried grass and snow fairly recently, as it still had that long piece of grass hanging from near its mouth. Wasn't sure whether to remove it or not - it's in quite a few photos - but decided to leave it just as it was. Right decision, lol?

I was also lucky enough to see three other Great Gray Owls, my first Mountain Bluebird of the year (always such a wonderful flash of brilliant blue), a Pileated Woodpecker, and an American Robin (always takes me by surprise when I see a Robin out in the middle of nowhere). A beautiful female Ruffed Grouse helped make my day, too. Guess I can say I was definitely rewarded for getting up so early, even though I might have seen all, or most, of these birds later in the day, too.

That was a good winter for Great Gray Owls. Since then, very few people seem to have been seeing them, unfortunately. Hope to get out looking soon. I have to check my car today to see if I can open the hood and then get it closed again. This was difficult to do on Saturday, after a woman suddenly cut right across my lane of moving traffic and there was no time for me to stop. When the other driver and I checked the hood of my car, we found that it was very difficult to get it closed again. I'm really hoping I don't have to take my vehicle in for some kind of repair.