Finding a snowy owl
My 3-day run around Alberta to find a bloody owl
In January, I had an errand to find an owl I had not seen yet, one famous for its looks and wonderful demeanour. This was not an easy task, and one that I would find frustrating from the start, all the way to taking the photos.
It all started in December 2025 when I helped out at the Christmas bird count in Tofield, Alberta, Canada. A large but friendly group of people and I met to take part in the yearly bird count. This is an annual event that takes place in December for a few weeks, and it is run by Audubon, which will be conducting its 227th annual bird count between Dec 14, 2026, and January 5, 2027!
After we had all finished the bird count, a few of us went driving to find a snowy owl. We went down Range Road after Township Road in rural Alberta. To my sadness and frustration, we did not find a snowy owl.
So came many weeks of frustration looking for this owl; I would check eBird and read for any reports of the little snowy owls, but to no avail. So one Saturday morning, I grabbed my keys and went back out to Tofield. I started looking, slowly driving up and down each road, looking left and right, camera ready on the passenger seat. For this, when on for 3-hole days. over a few weekends. I would dedicate 4 to 6 hours each time to find this owl.
Until about 03:00 PM, I was driving up the range road, and came across a blob of snow on a fence in the middle of a farmer's field. Was it? I thought it was just some snow at first. It was about 800-900 meters away, and I could not believe I had finally found it!
However, this was the point at which I realised I was very far away from it, and even with my lens zoomed in to 800mm, it would be a hard photo to get right.
Now came the hard part taking a good photo, I had privet land between myself and the owl, i just wanted to be about 100m closer to the white blob. Not too close i would destress it but not so far away that i needed to xoom in so much. this was also going to need to be croped one i had the photo, sio making it as clear of a shot as posable was realy importent.
My second Issue was that there was a hurd of cows behind the owl, which turned out to be a much bigger problem than the owl's distance. Yousee somthing that i found out on this shot was that cows are hot, so very very hot. And with it being -40 outside, the cows were destroying the air just from their own bodies.
What was going on for me was that this snowy owl was chilling; she did not look like she had anywhere to go. In fact, she looked very much at home and very happy watching the world go by.
I had also noted that I could use the dark colours of the cows as a way to make the owl pop out from all the snow.
So, I started to line up my shot, fort thing with any bird! Get a photo, theu will fly off just as you set up and its better to atlest have a bad photo then no photos
I lined the cows up so that they would be just behind the owl. This was the moment that I noticed how much air was being disrupted by the cows' heat. This was also the moment when I thought the photos would be really bad.
For those who ask why I did not just hop over the fence and walk a few more steps to get closer to the owl, well, there were 2 reasons!
It was private property, and I hear Canadian farmers have guns
I left my car running as it was so cold, so during the moments when I was filming, I could pop back into the car and have a tea and warm up
The snow was about 2 feet deep; there would have been no way I would have been able to walk in that snow with the winter boots I had on
So I took my photos, and I also discovered that I might need a better tripod; cheap tripods are still very shaky when you're zoomed in so much.
I took my photos and film, and without a question in my mind, I was very happy with how they turned out. The cows helped separate the owl from the background, and although I could not see what the owl was doing, the film turned out amazing…
Snowy Owl
Canon EOS R6 Mark III, Canon RF200-800mm, 6.625, 1/800, f/10
