Long-tailed Ducks

Today I participated in the Northeast Indy Christmas Bird Count here in Indianapolis. The weather was quite brisk, but that did not deter the birds.

We had a great time finding all kinds of interesting birds. Surprisingly, we had over a thousand robins in our count circle today!

We found Greater White-fronted Geese, Northern Harriers, Red-shouldered Hawks and, my favorite, five Short-eared Owls at the Mt. Comfort Airport. You can read the prior post to find out a bit about "shorties".

And the find of the day? Two Long-tailed Ducks, Clangula hyemalis! Long-tailed Ducks are not a common visitor to Indianapolis. These are sea ducks, usually found in much deeper waters. We found these creatures at Geist Reservoir.

This is a photo my friend Cheryl Harner took a few days ago at the Huron City Pier in Ohio of a female Long-tailed Duck. Just take this pic and double it, and you have the view we had today. Two females in winter plumage. These ducks truly enjoy diving, so we had to keep watching for them to surface. Up they would pop, then like miniature Houdinis, they would vanish below the surface.

A cool fact is they are able to dive as deep as 200 feet in order to forage under the water. Wow!

Male Long-tailed Duck in winter plumage. Photo by Arthur Grosset from the Patuxent Wildlife Research Center.

The common name of the duck comes from the extremely long feathers that make up the tail of the male drake. Above is a picture of the male in winter plumage. Such a striking animal. A better look at the male bird swimming can be found at Internet Bird Collections.

The Long-tailed Duck graces the Federal Duck Stamp for the 2009-2010 season. A little known fact is that 98 cents of every dollar from duck stamp sales go to purchase or lease wetlands. This is critical for many duck species' survival. If you love ducks, I strongly urge you to support this wonderful program by buying your own duck stamp, today.

Goose Pond/Hawthorn Mine CBC and Short-eared Owls

Yesterday, Dec. 17th, I participated in the Goose Pond/Hawthorn Mine Christmas Bird Count. The preliminary results turned up 103 species on a very icy day! Don Gorney and I lucked out and had a section with lots of rarities in Hawthorn Mine. Don even found a Black Scoter, a real gem for the area.

I love to bird in this area, especially in the winter. My favorite bird is found there-the Short-eared Owl, Asio flammeus. We saw about 30 of them yesterday. I have seen hundreds over the years, but I never tire of seeing shorties.

Shorty courtesy of Great River National Wildlife Refuge

I had a fairly good shot of a Shorty, but somehow I was struck by the photo gremlins. Usually the pics show up on my photo card. This time it ended up on my camera's internal memory and dang it if I can't find my cord. If any of my friends or family find my cord to my camera, I will buy you lunch! So I am using public domain photos, for this post.


Short-eared Owls are the coolest birds. I love their eyes, piercing bright yellow orbs encircled with black. They look like Tammy Faye did their make-up. I also love their ability to completely disappear. They can hunker down in the grass, so well-camouflaged, you could walk right by and never even detect them. There is an amazing photography book by Art Wolfe called Vanishing Act. One of my favorite photos has a Short-eared Owl that is totally concealed in grasses.

Short-eared owl courtesy of Lacreek National Wildlife Refuge

Short-eared Owls do not have a traditional "hoot". They bark, a sort of "Nyeep", which reminds me of a Monty Python skit. I love the cute little barks that they utter while they float effortlessly over the grasses looking for tasty vole snacks. Snausages!

The Goose Pond/Hawthorn Mine are located approximately 2 hours southwest of Indianapolis near the towns of Linton, Dugger Sandborn and Pleasantville. If the weather is fairly mild, the short-eared owl show will probably be showing until late January.