Photographing A Screech Owl

     Back in early March, A wildlife photographer friend gave me the location of an eastern screech owl's roosting cavity, in exchange for me giving him the location for the Saxonville fox den. It took me a while to find the tree cavity. When I found it 3 days later, It was empty. I knew that the owl would be there in the late evening, So I started going there often. I went about twice a week for a month. Nothing. The weather was getting warmer too, meaning the owl would spend less and less time in it's cavity, as it started to focus on nesting, and feeding it's chicks. I stopped checking the hole in July...

    On December 1st, I was photographing the great horned owls in the pine grove one afternoon. I called another wildlife photographer, Harold Wilion, to let him know I had found one of them...

I love the photo below. Great horned owls spend most of the day just sitting there sleeping, and it's always interesting to see one scratching, stretching it's wings, or preening...

...When Harold was only four miles away, the owl took off. When he got there, we walked around the pine grove, looking for it, but only saw it fly by a few times: it was about 4:10, the sun was down, and the owls were hunting. I mentioned that I had been checking the hole for the screech owl so much, and apparently, the conditions that day were perfect. We left, as it got too dark, after being serenated by the hooting great horned owl pair from an unseen perch.

    On my way home, I had the screech owl stuck in my mind, and decided to stop by the screech owl hole for the first time in awhile. I walked down the little path that lead to the hole. For some reason, I felt really good about it, like i knew i was going to be successful. Maybe it was just that it was freezing, dark, and my fingers were numb. If I were an owl, I would have tucked myself into my roosting cavity too. I found the tree, and took a few steps back, to check for the owl. I scanned the tree, up and down for the familiar, black rectangle that is the screech owl's cavity. I didn't see it. It was very dark, and I scanned the length of the tree trunk again. I still didn't see the hole. Then I got confused by what I saw for a second. It looked like the tree had healed. I thought for a split second that there was wood filling in most of the hole. Then the "wood" moved a little bit. That's when I realized it wasn't wood, it was feathers. The screech owl was staring straight at me. I started taking out my camera as fast as I could. I looked back up at the cavity to see that it was empty again. I knew that it didn't take off though, and I waited for about 5 minutes, staring at the hole.

While it was tucked away, I made my way to a soft area about 40 feet away from the tree, and layed down, trying to look as small as possible from the point of view of the tree. Finally, I saw it start to poke out of the hole a little bit...

The owl was very skittish, and it was hard to even move without it lowering itself back into the darkness. My shutter speed was very slow, and I had to try to hold the camera perfectly still. The only thing I could do to improve my photos, was to get closer. I inched forward, very slowly, trying to rustle as few leaves as possible. Luckily, the owl stayed visible. I came up to the back of a huge boulder, that gave me both cover, and a spot to rest my camera, to reduce shake. 

...This gave me sharper images, and it was perfectly timed, because as soon as I was ready to start taking more photos, It stood up.

Eastern screech owls come in three different color morphs: red, brown, and gray. This individual is a red morph screech owl. Red morphs are easier to find, because they contrast the gray tree bark

As it got darker and darker, I had to use a longer and longer shutter speed to prevent the images from becoming silhouettes of a tree trunk, until at around 4:40, when I was struggling to even see the tree that the owl was in, and my photos were coming out like this...

I headed back to my car, and headed home, proud of my photos even though they were blurry and dark. I finally found the screech owl, which had been my goal for almost a year. Now my only main goal species is a bobcat. That night, I was already making plans to visit the hole again the next evening.

The next day, I got out of school, and planned to meet up at the cavity with Harold. Both him, and the photographer who gave me this location use longer lenses than mine, and use a remote controlled shutter to eliminate the camera shake that is caused by pressing the shutter button. We got ourselves set up at 4:00 pm, and waited for the owl's little orange head to show. It finally popped up at 4:30, at first, only showing it's eyes...

...and as it got dimmer, it climbed up, to get a better look at us...

It was once again too dark to keep photographing, so we decided to call it a day. Apparently this individual screech owl starts flying late in the evening compared to other screech owls Harold has shot in Massachusetts. I haven't seen it take off at all yet, so I know this one waits until it's absolutely pitch black to start hunting.

I didn't come the day after that, (December 3rd), mostly because it was pouring the entire day. Not only does it make photographing the owl less comfortable, but it meant it wasn't popping up. I returned on December 4th, for my third night at the owl's cavity. I arrived at 3:50, getting there early so I could set up my tripod before it poked up. I was walking down the last stretch of the path before I reached the tree, and already spotted the little orange face of the owl sticking out. I was surprised to see the screech owl out this early in the evening...

...I took that photo, looked back up at the tree to aim my camera for another one, and realized the orange fluff had disappeared. My shutter had spooked it. I figured it wouldn't pop back up for a while, so i used the time to set up my little tripod. This is the tripod that came with the monocular I did a post on, that I bought back in February. I forgot about the monocular when I bought my 18-400mm lens for my camera. I finally had a use for it's tripod, though, when I was dealing with the camera shake photographing this owl at such slow shutterspeeds. After 15 whole minutes of adjusting the angle, and fidgeting with the loosening knob on the top of the tripod, I finally had my setup ready for the screech owl's orange face to re-appear:

I finally saw movement again at 4:25. I saw it hesitate, and then stick it's head up to watch me...

               ...Too bad I was adjusting the manual focus while it stretched its neck up at the sky...

by this point I had visited the hole successfully 3 times. So far I had already learned several lessons on how to shoot the screech owl: 

The best time to photograph it (at least at this time of year) is from 4:20pm to about 4:45pm, which is right after the sun sets, because the lighting isn't horrible, but the owl is comfortable enough to be photographed. This time range is the happy medium. Trying to shoot the owl before 4:20pm results in the owl being too skittish to photograph for more than a couple seconds, and photographing it after 4:45 results in a fuzzy, dim photo, at least with my camera.

While shooting the screech owl, I have to shoot in manual, and chase the sun with my shutter speed: the darker it gets, the slower my shutter speed has to be, to take in more light. by 4:45, I'm usually shooting in over 1 second long shutterspeeds. Using a slow shutterspeeds means I have to either hold the camera as still as I possibly can, holding my breath to prevent my hands from moving, Or I can take the 15 minutes required to set up and adjust my tripod.

When the owl is spooked, and retreats into the bottom of it's hole, it will usually pop back up 10 to 20 minutes later, depending on the time of day, and other factors. On the days when I see his head sticking out of it's hole before 4:15, It's been cloudy, dim, or freezing. Still, though, it's very skittish during light hours. I hope as I continue to visit it's cavity, it will get more comfortable and tolerant around me, so I can photograph it during daylight hours, and I'll be able to get some way better shots of it, with the fast, sharper shutterspeeds.

I went to the hole early on in the evening. I arrived at 3:30, and looked at the hole from a long distance, to not disturb it, only to see that the owl was still asleep, tucked away...

I walked around near the hole for a few minutes...

...And then returned to the rock, to set up the tripod. I waited for about 10 minutes. I saw little eyes and a face rise from the darkness. I slowly positioned myself to take a photo, and it ducked back into the darkness. I had now seen this happen multiple times and knew it would return to view in a few minutes. Harold showed up, and we both readied ourselves for it to come back up. It re-appeared about 15 minutes later, at 4:34pm...

It quickly got dark, but my tripod combined with my now expert skills on holding the camera completely still meant I still got good shots. I think this night (December 5th) was my best set at this location so far.

I am going to continue coming to the screech owl's cavity, but I'm gonna finish the post with that visit, because I doubt I can get better photos than that unless it's out during the day.