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Project SNOWstorm is arguably the largest and most comprehensive study of Snowy Owl movement, ecology, health and toxicology in the world. It started as an ad hoc collaboration of researchers and banders during the Snowy Owl irruption of 2013 – 14. Based at the Ned Smith Center for Nature and Art in Millersburg,, Pennsylvania Project SNOWstorm coordinates the efforts of over 40 volunteer scientists, bird banders, wildlife veterinarians and pathologists. It is also unique in that it is supported entirely through small, crowd-funded donations from the general public. ^[1]

In the Summer of 2013 an abundance of lemmings and voles in Quebec’s Ungava Peninsula attracted a large number of breeding Snowy Owls. Ample prey led to larger clutch sizes and improved survival of offspring. When food is scarce clutch sizes range from 4 – 7 eggs, but clutches of 5 – 10 eggs are more typical and as many as 16 eggs are possible with such plentitude. ^[2]

According to Project SNOWstorm co-founder Scott Weidensaul, “You had a large number of snowy owls nesting there that produced a very large number of chicks, and there was enough food that almost all of those babies survived. And it was mostly those young owls flying south the next winter on their first migration that provoked that enormous mega-irruption that we saw in the winter of 2013-2014.” ^[3]

Aware of the magnitude of the irruption, ornithologists, researchers, and banders sought ways to mobilize others and generate as much data as possible in advance of a push south during the winter migration into more populated areas in Southern Canada and the United States. During the winter of 2013-2014, Snowy Owls were spotted in Bermuda ^[4] and near Jacksonville, Florida. ^[5]

After securing permission from the US Bird Banding Lab to fit wintering Snowy Owls with transmitters, Project SNOWstorm caught and began tracking its first Owl, named Assateague, for the coastal Maryland island where it was captured. Researchers learned valuable new information and were surprised to see nocturnal hunting flights made over open water and that Assateague would use the same channel markers and buoys as nighttime hunting perches. ^[6]

In their first season, Project SNOWstorm banded 22 Snowy Owls.

Snowy Owls are nomadic breeders. Rather than returning to the same breeding areas each year, they search over large distances and breed in locations that vary greatly year after year. Using data from Project SNOWstorm, including GPS/GSM tracking data that could provide detailed locations and track movements with a frequency of 30 - 36 minute intervals, researchers were able to make several significant discoveries.

Snowy Owls do not use stopovers to determine if a location is suitable for breeding. Contrary to what was assumed before the trove of tracking information was made available by Project SNOWstorm, researchers believed that Snowy Owls would make frequent stops to test for the abundance of food, particularly lemmings. What they found contradicted those assum,ptions. Snowy Owls stop to rest and refuel, not to evaluate habitat. Stopovers are much more frequent in early migration and were rare once the owls reached the arctic. 73% of the stopovers occured on frozen lakes or ice edges. Frozen lakes provide camouflage for the Snowy Owl and limited open water concentrates waterfowl, a food source for migrating owls.

Snowy Owls also time their migration with snow and ice melt. Stopover duration and frequency were higher in the south as the owls waited for the snow and ice further north to melt and retreat. Stopovers averaged 5 - 6 days, but could last lkongher while waiting for ice to breakup on the Great Lakes, for instance.

The same study also found that Snowy Owls can determine prey conditions while in flight and that they did not need to stop in the Arctic to determine a suitable breeding site.

Adult owls arrived on the breeding grounds earlier than immatures even though they leave their wintering grounds at roughly the same time. While it was previously understood that immature males move further south during winter and adult females, the most dominant, stay the farthest north, the distance travelled by migrating birds is not as significant as the fact that adult snow owls reach their summer range faster because they are more experienced in finding good prey areas and they make more efficient decisions.

As immature birds rarely breed, there is no urgency for them to arrive early on the breeding grounds.^[7]

By 2022, Project SNOWstorm, along with colleagues at other institutions, had amassed data on over 400 deceased Snowy Owls, the largest such data set in the world.^[8] Combined with the tracking of 115 owls using GPS/GSM transmitters, researchers have gained valuable insights into Snowy Owl migration patterns and habitat selection after they leave their breeding grounds.^[9] This data highlights the natural and anthropogenic threats Snowy Owls face.

On January 9, 2014, a young, male Snowy Owl was captured at Philadelphia International Airport, named 'Philly," and then relocated 40 miles to the west in rural Lancaster County, Pennsylvania. In a matter of days, Philly returned to the airport. He liked to hang out at the end of runway 27R and his favorite evening hunting perch was along I-95. Researchers were aware of the dangers posed by aircraft and motor vehicles, and on January 29, Philly was struck by a cargo plane and killed.^[10][11]

According to Weidensaul, Snowy Owls are drawn to airports because "Where they come from, there are no trees. It's flat and treeless. They're looking for places that look like home."^[12] In addition to the homelike topography presented by airports, "birds, rodents, or other small mammals that are accommodated by the stands of poorly-maintained grass and border, or edge, habitats present."^[13] Between 2009 and 2023 the FAA reported over 250 Snow Owl collisions with aircraft, from 55 airports in the US and Canada. Asides from the risk to humans aboard those aircraft and to the Snowy Owls, the financial impact was estimated at $2.8-Million. ^[14][15]

Researchers questioned whether relocation efforts were effective. To find out they focuses on 13 airports and captured and tagged 42 owls captured at them. Researchers determined that immature females and adult males were less likely to return to the airports where they were captured. They also learned that the higher the proportion of croplands and wetlands at the relocation site, the less likely the snowy owls were to return to the airport. Distance also played a factor, with less owls returning to an airport if they were moved further than 100km / 60 miles away from it. They reported a 67% success rate with relocate birds not returning to the airport. ^[16]

Necropsies performed by those affiliated with Project SNOWstorm, most notably the Pennsylvania Animal Diagnostic Lab System (PADLS) at the University of Pennsylvania School of Veterinary Medicine revealed that a majority of dead Snowy Owls examined were killed by collisions with cars or airplanes. ^[17]

https://www.mass.gov/info-details/snowy-owl#:~:text=When%20people%20consistently%20approach%20birds,on%20raptors%20remain%20largely%20unknown.