All photos are copyright Allan or Cathy Murrant unless otherwise stated.
We flew to Winnipeg MB early morning on Tuesday February 25, 2020. We arrived 10:30am and headed out to the northeast of the city.
We drove northeast on highway 59, we made a stop at Birds Hill Provincial Park. We continued northeast on highway 59 to highway 317 traveled east, then north on Maple Creek Road. The first owl we found was Northern Hawk Owl. It was not a lifer, we had our first on the Sand Lake Road, CBRM. We drove up and down the Maple Creek Road finding a second Northern Hawk Owl.
We left Maple Creek Road back toward Winnipeg along 317 heading west. It was 4:30 pm and we spotted our first Great Gray Owl. We were so happy and excited to get our first on the first day of our visit.
Wednesday February 26 we headed north on highway 8 to Hecla Island Provincial Park. We drove the road through the park the first owl we had was Northern Hawk Owl #3. It was seen on the bypass to the town of Hecla. We spent the day on Hecla and we found our 3rd Great Gray Owl on the side of the bridge as we left the island.
Leaving Hecla Island we headed south on highway 8. Not long after leaving before we got to Riverton we had our 3rd Great Gray Owl. It was on a fence post in a field. This is the only Great Gray Owl we saw pounce after a mouse. It jumped off a fence post into the snow. It was half buried in the snow but never caught anything. It returned to the fence post perch with nothing.
We continued south on highway 8 and spotted Northern Hawk Owl #4 in some trees above a farm house near Juntion 229.
Thursday February 27 we headed east on Dugald Road (highway 15). The first owls for the day were a pair of Great Horned Owls on a nest near the town of Glass. We turned north at Elma along highway 11. We found Northern Hawk Owl #5 on the wires on the road side. This owl was seen in the morning and evening on the 27th and 28th.
We continued north to highway 44 then east to Rennie. Northern Hawk Owl #6 was seen 19km from Rennie on a dead tree. We had Great Gray Owl #4, 15km from Rennie it was perched a distance off the road we never got pictures.
From Rennie we traveled north on highway 307 to Seven Sister Falls. On our return we saw Great Gray Owl #5 on Dugald Road 66km from the highway 101. It was southwest of Lewis Road.
Friday February 28 We had Northern Hawk Owl #7 on Maple Creek Road and #8 Northern Hawk Owl on highway 520 Pinawa Hill Road intersection.
Monday March 2 We took a drive north on highway 8 then on to the 234 north to Pine Dock. The bird of the day was a Golden Eagle seen 19km north of Hecla.
Tuesday March 3 We took Dugald Road east and turned off onto Old Highway 15. We found Great Gray Owl #6 at 1pm 8.5km from Elma. We thought it would be a long time before we would see another so we spent the afternoon with it.
Other sightings on our trip were Raven, Black-billed Magpie, Gray Jay, White-winged Crossbill. Red Crossbill, Sharp-tailed Grouse, Bald Eagle, Common Redpoll, Pine Siskin, Northern Shrike, Pileated Woodpecker, Snow Bunting and White-breasted Nuthatch.