This beautiful female Arctic Snowy Owl has come from parts unknown and has settled on various rooftops in Cypress, CA. During the day, she stays within a 4 block area sharing her beauty with various home owners. She has been here about three weeks feeding at night from a nearby military base. In a couple of the photos she is coughing up regurgitated pellets. The pellets (probably rats) are made up of bones and fur the owl wont digest. Her brown coloring indicates she is a female. Males are mostly all white. Shot with a hand-held Nikon Z9 70-200 w/2x TC. Cropped quite a bit.

I live in the Rockies at 7820 feet above sea level and when I arose yesterday (5/21) at 6AM it was snowing heavily, there was 12 inches of snow (none the day before), and 24 degrees. Several Hummingbirds had arrived in the previous two weeks and I was immediately concerned if they had survived. After dark the day previously I had taken in the sugar water feeder I had been putting out and now wondered if there was anything to be gained by putting it out again in such weather. But I decided to do so and hung it from a post on one of our decks. To my great astonishment, by the time I had gone 4 steps to the house door a Hummer was on it feeding!!! In pouring snow and 24 degrees!

Soon there was some congestion on the feeder so I filled and put out a second one at the opposite edge of the deck and while I was standing there hanging it another Hummer was hovering 1 - 2 feet away waiting for me to finish. As soon as I did it began feeding. This continued all day and after dark I took the two feeders in. This morning (the snow had stopped and it was a bit warmer) I hung them again and for awhile there was no activity and my heart sank, fearing they had died during the cold, cold night. However, after awhile they did start visiting the feeders, although not in the numbers of the day before.

This was my first experience in about 50 years of bird watching of seeing Hummingbirds being active in snowfall and sub freezing temperatures. Perhaps others have and I would like to hear those experiences. I have uploaded one of the many photos I took and would like to add a few more but can't find how to do that. The photos are of poor technical quality because of the falling snow, bird movement, and my having to shoot through window glass. Sorry I couldn't do better.