DULUTH, Minn. _ Rich Hoeg of Duluth was doing some birding near Silver Creek on the North Shore recently when he came face to face with a snowy owl.
"It was just 10 feet away," said Hoeg, 61, an avid birder and photographer.
The white owl with the dark flecks in its feathers was a creature of the Arctic. A few snowies come down as far as Minnesota and Wisconsin each year. Some years, they come into the U.S. by the thousands.
Hoeg watched the owl for a bit and took a few photos. He and another birder noticed in the photos some orange near one of the owl's wings. A blood stain? Possibly.
Hoeg left the bird alone but returned that evening, in the hour before sunset, to check on it. The owl hadn't budged. Hoeg suspected it was injured or too weak to move.
Following detailed instructions from a phone conversation with Frank Nicoletti, banding director at Hawk Ridge Bird Observatory in Duluth, Hoeg approached the owl from behind as it sat on the ground.
"The key was to come up behind the bird, and slowly lower a blanket over the owl," Hoeg wrote in a Facebook post. "Then grab the snowy from behind. As talons only move forward, the owl will not be able to sink its talons into you."
