Hi  Folks!

Gail Franz wrote:
- What is the effect of frequent noises and/or disturbances on the birds 
while they're attempting to roost?
- After finding an owl at a particular location & passing on that 
information, are you confident that all birders will act respectfully towards the bird?

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Northern Saw-whet Owls are notorious for not really caring about humans.  As long as you do not poke them or shake the tree, they are content to sit.  As a very young man I had the opportunity to be with a bander who captured by hand many Saw-whets.  He would capture the bird, band it, take mearurements and then replace it on the branch where it was found.  More often than not, the bird remained at that perch.  Later visits by humans did not cause them to flush.  It seems that Saw-whets are extremely tolerant.

When I use "toot" call whistling, it is at dark. The birds are up and active. I never use a flashlight to see the bird because I believe bright light is a significant disturbance to a night creature.  Sometimes I use infrared.  Night time searching is used to find a general location for a daytime search.

The two locations I posted are both public lands.  In the former, the owls are roosting 30-50 feet up in a tree.  I doubt that they even pay any attention to a human walking through the woods.  In the latter, there is 100 acres of habitat, most of which is so overgrown with vines and mutiflora rose and blackberry, that it would take a monumental effort for someone to find a roosting Saw-whet.  

Unlike other owls that roost in pines and vine tangles [Barn, Barred, Long-eared, Great-horned] [note:Screech is most likely to be in a cavity roost] you can walk right past the tree where the Saw-whet is roosting and it will not flush.

Because I do not know all birders and have seen some monumentally bad habits by some [such as walking into a farmer's crop field to get closer to an obvious Snowy Owl and not having permission to trespass] and the know skitishness of some species [especially Long-eared Owls] I do not post specific locations to a roost site.  On rare occasions, I will tell others about a roost site if it is possible to see the bird without entering it's "concern zone" or "flush zone" and they are know to me to be trustworthy.

Good Birding!

Jim

Jim Stasz
North Beach MD