E55 Denver Holt — Snowy Owls, Field Research & 35 Years on the Arctic Tundra! 🦉❄️

Few people understand owls like Denver Holt. As the founder of the Owl Research Institute, Denver has spent nearly four decades studying owls in the wild — from long-eared owls in Montana to snowy owls on the Arctic tundra.

In this episode, Denver joins Scott Harris to explore what it really means to be a “boots on the ground” field biologist. From cross-country skiing into remote nesting territories to enduring Arctic summers in Utqiaġvik (Barrow), Alaska, his work is a testament to patience, persistence, and deep observation.

The conversation dives into the power of long-term research, revealing how decades of data can challenge assumptions about owl populations, lemming cycles, and environmental change. Denver also reflects on the early influences that shaped his path — including a chance encounter that set him on a lifetime journey with birds of prey.

They also discuss:

🦉 Why long-term studies reveal truths short-term research misses
 ❄️ Snowy owls, lemmings, and the mysteries of Arctic ecosystems
 🌙 The difference between field research and computer-based inference
 📊 What 35 years of data can (and can’t) tell us about population trends
 🌍 How owls can serve as powerful ambassadors for conservation

This is a conversation about curiosity, discipline, and the value of truly knowing a species — not just studying it, but living alongside it.

📬 Stay curious — and get bonus content & updates:
 👉 https://naturallyscott.kit.com/5fd12c6752

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

Hello. If you like owls, and it seems like most of us do, and a growing number of us do, you're going to love today's episode of Naturally Scott. I'm your host, Scott Harris, and today I bring you Denver Holt. Denver is the founder and continues to operate the Owl Research Institute based in Montana. Um, it is a fascinating time that I spend with him. As a matter of fact, I literally spent some time with him recently. I went up to Montana and went up for a couple of days with him and worked with some long-eared owls, which was spectacular for me. I got to hold them. Um, I got to release one, I got to help catch them in the mist nets and learn about the work that they do. It was really quite interesting. Denver's going to talk about what he calls his misspent youth, and then he's going to go into depth about field research, boots on the ground, as he likes to call it, and the value of long-term studies. When I say long-term studies, he has studies that go back decades, and it is just an amazing thing to learn about. Long-eared owls and snowy owls are two of the prime ones, but he's done work with others as well. We're going to talk about all those, what he's learned, what he's experienced, what he's continuing to do, and I think you will love owls even more relatively soon. Enjoy this episode of Naturally Scott. Enjoy meeting Denver Holt. Have a terrific day.

SPEAKER_01 1:21

I had two o'clock written down, but it was two my time. Yeah, you know, I was running around last night. You'll say, what am I gonna do?

SPEAKER_02 1:32

A productive trip, but nonetheless, highlighted by my visit with you. Welcome to this episode of Naturally Scott. I'm your host, uh Scott Harris, and I am so excited about today. I know I say that every time, but once again, it's true. Um, I get to welcome Denver Holt to the podcast today. Denver, welcome.

SPEAKER_01 1:52

Hey, Scott, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 1:55

You you bet we've got plenty to talk about. Now, I have had the huge good fortune of spending a little time with Denver. Um, I first met him when I interviewed him for my book, Why We Love Burge, which he graciously agreed to be a guest on. And uh by the end of that uh conversation, um, I had finagled an invitation up to his place in Mission Valley, Montana. I have no shame. And um got to spend a couple days up there, and we are definitely going to talk about that. Um, but before we do, let's talk a little bit. Let's open with the Owl Research Institute. Denver Holt is the founder. Uh if I remember right, you founded it with some friends right out of college, but you're the last man standing that's still with the Owl Research Institute from the very beginning.

SPEAKER_01 2:44

Yes, yeah. I I I yeah, I founded it, I guess 87, 88 was kind of like, you know, when we started doing the applications. And and you're right, I got a bunch of friends because I needed people that would stand by me, you know, and uh and didn't really have much, you know, they couldn't override me for anything, so that was the best part about it, you know. So uh I started it then, and um, you know, uh I I basically started it, Scott, uh because I just wanted to be a field researcher. And I looked at, you know, my future in wildlife and and you know it just looked to me that if I was even lucky enough to get a job it would have been with, you know, the traditional homes of research, which tend to be the the feds, the state, uh, or the university system. And within that, you know, after you know being in college for years, I kind of thought, you know what, if I was lucky enough to get a job, I'm gonna end up indoors most of my life. And that's not what I want. I just wanted to be a field researcher and do long-term studies. So I was fortunate enough to get on with some, you know, NGOs, you know, like Audubon Societies in Massachusetts or Nature Conservancies and and work with some NGOs. And I saw a little bit more flexibility there to be a field researcher. And so I hatched the Owl Institute and you know, more guts and brains. And um now we're probably the most uh active or one of the most active Owl research groups in the world.

SPEAKER_02 4:19

Well, I I think that is that is spectacular. And I want to talk about it. I want to talk about your boots on the ground philosophy and uh field research and all those good things that you're so passionate about. But it would be unfair to our guests if we didn't drift back in time a little bit to your misspent youth. And I am using and and and and Gina in the background there, if you're panicking, I'm using Denver's term on that, misspent youth. Um you have a story about an old friend and a fascinating woman that you met that took you under her wing. And I think it's a great story. Would you mind sharing that with the audience? Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_01 4:58

Um well, I guess I had too much energy when I was young. And um too much mitochondria, I now can say, the powerhouse of the cell. So anyway, I couldn't sit still. And I got in trouble a lot. I was a little mischievous, and uh, and so I got in trouble skipping school and you know, doing the things that you do when you skip school when you're young, like, you know, drugs and drinking and things of that sort. And um and we built a fort uh in the woods on this Audubon property or something like that. And one day my phone rang. I was skipping school that day, actually. I don't know why I answered the family phone, but I did. And it was this woman who asked for me, and I said who I was, and she said, Well, I have just learned about your fort up there on the Underwood property, which is also the Audubon Habitat property. And um, it's very nice. She was actually nice, and she goes, but it's got to come down. She goes, You clearly have put a lot of work into it, but you know, you guys shouldn't do that. Anyway, she said, So we're you know, we're having meetings, all the landowners, and uh we're gonna take your fort down, and I wanted to let you know beforehand. And I and I was kind of like, yeah, yeah, lady, whatever. And and um and then she ended it with, well, you clearly have good energy and your interests are are really whatever nice or something like that. If you ever need a summer job, just uh let me know. And she hung up. Uh and it turned out that one of the girls I went to school with is the one who gave me up and my friends. And so, uh, which is a part of the story 20 years later. Um so I did a summer job the next that summer or whatever it was, and I went to her house and she was a you know, wealthy, well-to-do um woman. And I went to the door and I said, um, she came out and I reminded her who I was. And she says, Well, I have a book club meeting right now, and I really can't talk to you, but could you bring me a couple letters of recommendation to say that you're a good boy? And I'm there, what do you mean? And she says, Well, give me two letters of people who say that you're a nice kid. And I go, All right. So, and she told the story to a writer many, many years later. Oh, Denver brought two letters, all right, one from, as she said it, one from a police officer and the other from a truant officer who both said he was a good kid, just going in the wrong direction. And uh anyway, she hired me and to do some landscaping. Uh, one day I was standing out there on the hill overlooking Boston, you know, because it was in Massachusetts, and and I saw a hawk flying over and I was looking at it, and she said, What are you looking at? And I go, Oh, there's a hawk up there. And she said, Well, how do you know what and uh or what it is? I go, Oh, it's a red tail hawk, actually, lady. And she said, Well, how do you know it's a red tail hawk? I go, It's got a red tail. I mean, how hard is that? And uh she said, Oh, and she walked away, came back out with a pair of binoculars and just kind of helped me with the binoculars to look at the hawk. And um and that kind of started it. She said, Do you like birds? And I said, Not really. But I like birds of prey are kind of cool, you know, and because they're predatory birds. And between that and landscaping, you know, time went on a little bit, and she took a little interest in me. And one day I came No, it was before that. Then I came yeah, I came to work this one day and the chief Cherokee was out and it's never out. And um she said we're going for a ride today and um she said we're gonna go out to Mont Tom and look uh Peregrine Falcons and and I go, What? And so anyhow, I got in the car and she uh had bought me a pair of seven by thirty-five Bushnell binoculars and uh a field guide. That was the Robins Field Guide. Um oh, who was the author of that? Um but anyway, it's the Robins Field Guide to the Birds of North America and uh and later I won the um the guy who wrote it, I won the Conservation Award for that, you know, 30 years later, uh and all that. But anyway, that kind of started it, and then she just kind of coached me along and pulled some strings to get me summer jobs and eventually ended up with Mass Audubon and you know one thing led to another. We actually published a couple papers together before she died, and um anyhow that's kind of how it it worked. And she never got to see when we were the cover of National Geographic. She died prior to that. Um but you know, she was that classic little Lady Bird watcher, except that she was wealthy and had a lot of connections.

SPEAKER_02 9:51

Well, that's fantastic. I I loved the story, uh uh even hearing it a second time. And you know, I wonder how many people are going to be telling the stories about you and the impact that you've had on their life and how maybe you changed the direction of the way you were going, because you've worked with a lot of young people at at ORI, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:11

Oh, yeah. It you know, it used to be when I first started out, we were pretty much all the same age, and then I was a few years older, then I was a few more years older, then a few more years older. And so all the young kids and interns and biologists, they all stay between, you know, 25 or 20 to 25, 27, and I just keep getting older. And uh anyway, yeah, I just like young kids. It's kind of fun, you know. Um, it's good for me. It makes me, you know, have to, you know, be up to speed on things in order to have discussions with them. Um you know, we think a little bit differently, but we try to get back to the basics of you know of field biology. Um, you know, they're technologically more advanced than than I am or was back then, but although back then I used the technology of our time. But now it you know it changes all the time. So anyway, uh it's a good thing. You know, it's a good thing. I'm tough on them. Um, you know, I'm I'm I'm pretty demanding, but at the end of the day, you know, I can sit and have a beer with them or buy dinner and sit and laugh, but during the course of work, you know, I'm serious and detailed and and I expect they will be in the future uh once they get over the shock of it.

SPEAKER_02 11:23

Well, I I think that's fantastic. Any idea how many how many young people you've worked with through the L Research Institute over the years?

SPEAKER_01 11:32

Oh god, you know, no. I mean it's gotta be oh gosh, we're we're like almost 40 years going now and hundreds, hundreds, you know. I mean, some of them, most of them don't you know a lot of times they're just trying to pad a resume and get uh, you know, a little experience here and there. But some of them who have stayed on with us um have have learned a lot. And I get a lot of really good feedback on the kids that work for me from uh in the future for the people that they've worked with about uh how detailed they are, how broad their knowledge is of ecology, because I demand that. You know, I you know I I demand that they're diverse and that they you know I always say uh what is it what's the saying? Jack of one trade, master of none. I always say jack of all or jack of all trades, master of one, you know, know your business better than anyone else, but also know everyone else's business.

SPEAKER_02 12:27

Well, I think that's a great thing. And I and I tell the audience that you know, when I was out there uh last month and got a chance to spend a couple days with Denver, I also got to spend some time with his crew um out beating the bushes, looking for long-eared owls and and catching them in miss nets and banding them, and I even got to release one. And but the the I call them kids because Denver were the same age. I think you're 70 and I'm 68. And um, you know, and these these kids are 25, 30, 35, maybe. Um, but they were all working hard. They were all listening to you, they all knew their jobs, they'd clearly paid attention um to what you were trying to teach them. And whether they stay with you for a decade or move on and do something else, um, I think you'll be I think you'll be spreading a little bit of the work that you do um around the country and around the world. And and I that's a that's a spectacular thing. That's a spectacular thing. And I do we're I I promise you we're gonna get to boots on the ground and field research. Okay, but I'm not I'm not done with your past yet. And now for the book I had asked you what your spark bird was, and you were kind of like, I wasn't even sure what the term was, but I guess if you made me pick, I'd say a peregrine falcon, and if you made me pick an owl, I'd say a northern pygmy, and if you made me pick a favorite, I'd pick a snowy. Tell me about that. Tell me about your thoughts on peregrines and northern pygmies and snowies, and and a matter of fact, go ahead and use the the do Snowy Last, and and when you're done with that, take us up to Barrow, Alaska.

SPEAKER_01 14:01

Well, it did start out with peregrines because the woman who kind of gave me this world of uh bird watching and Nancy Claflin, um, when she bought me those binoculars and the channel was the Chandler Robbins Bird Book, and that's the re award I won, the Chandler Robbins Conservation Award from American Birding Association. Um it was Peregrine Falcons that that was her interest for diurnal birds of prey. And she helped sponsor the first reintroduction projects of paragon. So it started out with paragons, and then when I went to school at the University of Montana, uh some kid came into ornithology classes and said his dad found an owl in a nest hole, and my buddy and I went up to look at it, and there actually was two owls this in the same tree, a pygmy owl and a saw an owl, one in in one high hole and a low hole, wolf woodpecker holes. And uh and I was like, God, these guys are kind of cool. So we uh we decided we would do our own study. I mean, we were pretty young, you know, sophomores or juniors or something like that. And we were pretty young, but we decided we would do our own study, and we skipped school and took turns and sat leaning up against a tree watching the nest holes um different times, morning, night, whatever. And then we finished up. And Billy, the a friend of mine at work, you know, he had a lot of gumption and he says, Oh, we should, we should write a paper. And I go, I don't know, I never did that. It was me neither, but everyone else seems to do it. We could probably do it. And so anyway, we ended up, you know, he wrote the first one on the simultaneous nesting of the pygmy owl and the sourdough, the same snag, and I wrote the second one on observations of nesting pygmy owls. And there, you know, there were observational studies, but you know, for kids that were not graduate students, you know, that wasn't so bad. And and I'll sidebar that with since then, I've probably had 15 to 20 undergraduates either senior author or co-author papers with us. So I've always been a proponent of give them a project, let them take the lead, let them go through the process of peer review, editing, and things of that sort. So that's the sidebar to that is a lot of young kids, before they even get into graduate school, have published papers with us.

SPEAKER_02 16:26

No, that's fantastic. Well, let's talk about some of the work you do. Now, your two mantras, if you will, the field research slash boots on the ground and the long-term studies. This is this is what you feel very strongly differentiates you uh from a lot of the research world. Is that fair to say?

SPEAKER_01 16:48

Yeah, yeah, that is fair to say. I mean, that was one of the objectives of starting the All Research Institute was to do long-term boots on the ground study. And again, you know, you I I gotta be careful because I hate to uh uh uh offend my friends and and colleagues and peers and all that stuff, but the writing was on the wall early on that I may not go out very much if I got a traditional job, that I would probably be in an office and um I didn't want to do that. So and and and I was also a little disappointed, I will say, that all these studies were just so short term and no one really really t and then a few, I won't say no one, but few people had really in-depth knowledge of these species that that they worked on. So I just said no, we want to do long-term studies, we want to get big sample sizes, and we want the studies need to be conducted by the same person because you evolve and you learn. I'm still evolving, I'm still learning. So I did. I started the whole like yeah, but are you in the field? Yeah, but boots on the ground is needed to confirm some of these theories and stuff like that and validate some of these observations and inferences. So that's been kind of the the mantra with us. And I think if you were to look at some of the papers we've published, you'll see sample sizes that are enormous and most most of the time. You'll see study duration that is very, very lengthy most of the time. And what comes with that is data that will stand the test of time, and and that's what you want. You know, you you want your data to be cited, you know, five, ten, fifteen, twenty years from now as hey, uh these people did some monumental studies. And not that they haven't been done before, because certainly some individual researchers take it upon themselves to, you know, study these things for a lifetime and to learn for a lifetime, but you know, the normal distribution is they don't.

SPEAKER_02 18:43

So what if we go back 40 years to when you started it, what were the first couple of studies that you did? What was it that got you out of bed in the morning doing the work?

SPEAKER_01 18:53

Well, it was the pygmy owls, you know, um in in in Montana. And that was that was kind of it. I was already developing kind of a uh an interest in in in in birds of prey. So I helped out. Uh you volunteered, you know. We always take advantage of our volunteers. So back then I was taking advantage of pretty well because of, you know, I had a lot of energy. And uh so I volunteered on the Peregrine Falcon surveys, I volunteered on the Bald Eagle surveys, I volunteered in, you know, most of the raptor surveys that were going on. So that kind of that that that kind of spearheaded me. And then when we found the owls, you know, we did a we did a actually I don't know how the hell we did this, but there was a a filmmaker out of Colorado, I think a Marty Stoffer or Stoffer or something like that, a long time ago. And and so for a senior, or what maybe it was it was it was a project, I don't know how we wrote to him. Billy had some film experience, so we wrote to this guy and said, Hey, we want to do a project on great horned owls and and we need this, this, and that. Well, turns out he sent us, he goes, Yeah, that sounds like a good idea. He gave us some film equipment or whatever, and I had no idea what we were doing, but Billy said he did. Uh, and so he gave us, you know, just about everything, and then I raised about, I don't know, a thousand dollars or something like that from various sources to pay us for you know months and months of work. And uh and the only thing he didn't give us was a case of Jack Dinos we asked for, I remember that.

SPEAKER_02 20:27

And um so it's a big start to any project.

SPEAKER_01 20:31

Yeah, so we did this film and uh and then we sent it to him and he said it was like the worst film he ever saw. And uh we we were like, oh, okay, forget that. And anyway, and then the finding the pygmy owl really is what got it started there, and and then I've just been dedicated to owls ever since because I've always been fascinated, you know, and all groups of animals have you know specialized adaptations to live where they live and to get by, you know, any way they do. And I just found the the adaptations in owls fascinating for me, and I found them to be extremely um really cool looking animals, you know. That I mean almost everybody looks at an owl and says, wow, that's a pretty cool looking animal. And there's only so many groups of animals in the world that get that type of admiration. And I fell right into it, and I knew then as a junior I wanted to study owls and I wanted to study it for a career.

SPEAKER_02 21:26

Wow. So again, backing up, when you say you were doing the surveys for the peregrine falcons, what does that mean?

SPEAKER_01 21:34

All right, that means that that means if someone's someone who's a biologist that's you know, generally speaking, you know, sitting in an office takes um young, energetic kids like myself back then and says, Yeah, I want you to climb that mountain and go look in the cliffs. I want you to go over here and go through the woods and And go up to these other cliffs, and I'd like you to actually do that throughout the western part of the state and give me your results. And that's how it started. And I did, you know, and I and and I learned a ton and and I didn't mind at all. And every once in a while I could talk one of these guys into coming in the field with me. And I remember Ron Escaniel with the Forest Service, and his heart was in field biology, but his job was administration. And I could get him to come out once in a while with me. And that that was actually pretty cool. And I learned a lot from him. And then um and then I did the bald eagle surveys for the state. And and it was funny because I got to know a lot of landowners on these projects, you know, because you had to cross private land and and you'd ask them questions, and you'd be surprised, you know, how much they knew about their surroundings and how helpful they were to me as well, you know, especially when it came to you know behavior of the like the Falcons or behind many of, um, but behavior of the Eagles and stuff like that. You know, I had strict guidelines on what to do and this and that. And you'd you'd go out with these farmers and ranchers on their property, and they'd be saying, you don't worry about that. Just, well, yeah, come on, we can walk right out of this. They don't care, you know. So anyway, it was just uh it was it was fun and it was a good learning experience. And again, it kind of solidified that I wanted to be a field researcher.

SPEAKER_02 23:23

All right. And so talk to us about that because I know that's important to you, the the difference between, if you'll allow me, between field research and desk research. Um what what is and we're and we'll get into long-term studies and the value of that, but what is the value of field research? Uh, you like to use the term boots on the ground, um, compared to desk research, which is not how you wanted to spend your life, which is fine, but what is the additional value of field research over computer modeling and you know, GPS tags and all those different things? Talk to us about that because you're passionate about it.

SPEAKER_01 24:08

Yeah, I you know, I mean, all these methods have their strengths and weaknesses, you know, for s for sure. Um but what I saw early on is that what that field research really was only a small percentage of what people's time were. And and there was again, it became a little bit more theoretical, more reading stuff, and more policy oriented. And and one of the things that I noticed is that and again, I always have to be careful because I don't want to offend my field because I I feel really passionate about the field of wildlife and wildlife conservation, but at the same time, I I I want people to have these experiences. And so one of the what was lacking, I thought, was true, again, if you want to use the word boots on the ground experiences, where when you talk to people who are more office-bound, they really can't relate to a lot of these, you know, boots on the ground experiences because they've had, you know, so few of them. Now you might have them when you're starting out, you maybe you're a graduate student and all that, but eventually you end up behind the desk. So and it I I would I would I would walk away, I guess, thinking, gosh, I thought he or she knew the ton about this species, but what it doesn't seem like they do. It doesn't seem like you really have many personal experiences with that. And it takes years upon years upon years to really gather the knowledge. You just can't go out for a couple seasons and and and gather really a ton of knowledge about anything because you're you're really learning, you're learning the whole time. So anyway, uh and and then as I got older and older and older, I realized that the jobs that were set out were really pretty much gonna make you an indoor person, except for maybe in the summertime. And it's really interesting if you look at literature, how many studies are conducted only in the summer when school's out, you know, and uh and for just in and only for a very short time, you know, I mean a few weeks a season, and then that was it. And I just felt that you were really missing developing expertise, because expertise takes time, lots of time, often a lifetime. And I just felt that a lot of the people that I that I was with, and again, I don't mean to offend them, but they were all good people. They all had specific jobs that was really important. I mean, some of the jobs are important compliance, funding, you know, EISs and things like that. Those were important things, and they're all ardent conservationists for the most part. But I always felt what they were lacking was really good expertise at being field biologists and then learning the methodologies for doing field biology. It takes time to do that stuff. You just don't do it in one or two or three seasons, you know, at two to three weeks. And it takes a lifetime to become good at this stuff. And so anyway, you know, those were all coming to the reasons that, you know, set me aside and and um put me on the path to being a boots on the ground field biologist.

SPEAKER_02 27:08

So, so help us understand. I mean, we're gonna talk about a handful of the studies you've done, but let's let's talk specifically right now about your snowy owl studies. Um and I, you know, I I love oh shoot, I've written it down here. The big white owl from the north, you call it. Yeah, and and you spend a lot of time in Barrow, Alaska, right?

SPEAKER_01 27:31

You'd look for the snowy owl right there.

SPEAKER_02 27:34

There you go. There you go. That's the next invitation I'm gonna finagle from you, by the way, is to come visit you up in Barrow.

SPEAKER_01 27:41

Yes. Okay. I'm sorry to digress there. Okay.

SPEAKER_02 27:45

That that that's all right. I just wanted to get it on film, so we'll we'll know that it was there and planted. But that being the case, what is it that you learn by spending a couple of months every year for how many years now have you been going to Barrow?

SPEAKER_01 27:59

Uh, I think that we just finished the 35th. I've been there almost every year. Not every year. You know, I hadn't my mother passed one year and so I didn't get there, and then I snapped my Achilles one year. But other than that, I've I've been there almost all 35 years.

SPEAKER_02 28:13

Okay, so over three decades, you've spent large portions of your summer in Barrow, Alaska studying the snowy owl. Is that fair to say? Correct. Okay, so what and and I'm not challenging you in that I don't believe you. I just want to understand. So, what have you learned that I can't learn by reading your papers and studying other papers and occasionally going out in the field? What's the in-depth? What are the next layers and levels uh that that you need years to accumulate that skill and that knowledge? What is it you're picking up?

SPEAKER_01 28:54

Well, you can read our papers and probably learn, but you still have to have experiences. And and and I think that's the key because you know, between you know, point A and point B is the gray area, and the gray area is it's just you make all these observations which kind of lead you to questions. So when we come up with with a question, it's not like you're just sitting around an office and coming up with questions, because you're outside and you're making observations. Oh, the male snowy owl is doing this, the female is doing that. Hey, isn't it interesting when we go to the nest that the lemmings in the nest that we weigh and measure, uh it looks like they're bigger than the ones in our sampling line, our trap lines and stuff like that. And you would never know that. Just, you know, you could read the paper and say, you know, Denver Holton colleagues have found that male snowy owls bring the biggest lemmings to their females and their families, and the others they don't. They either eat them or they don't bring them there. And so the observations and the boots on the ground will lead you to original questions. We don't ask many original questions anymore. And so some of the stuff that we've done over the years, I would say are original questions, just like what I'm saying here. Or measuring snow owl nest mounts, or looking at nest defense behavior. If you were just to read my papers or any, you know, anyone's papers, and there's some good snowy owl papers in the past who were good field ornithologists, um you really you wouldn't hear the sound. You would hear the hoot or the scream that the male makes or the female makes, or you wouldn't understand nest defense, by just reading a paper. When you walk to the nest, the first thing that happens is the female flushes off the nest when you're 350 yards away. Why does she do that? You wouldn't know that by reading the paper, uh, unless you made the observations. And then you looked at the observation, you said, that's kind of interesting that they do that. And then you walk to the nest, and pretty soon one comes in and vocalizes, and then another one fakes injury, and another one whacks you in the head, and then you start seeing, hey, there's a division of labor going on here in nest defense and vocalizations and in raising the family. You wouldn't get that by just catching a bird, putting a satellite transmitter on it, and then watching it fly around on a computer screen. That has value. I put the first satellite transmitters in any snowy aisle in the world, to put the first six on. Linda Schuke and I did that. And that gave rise to what we see today, which is a lot of really cool information. But the other side of that is you're making inferences from watching tracks on a computer screen versus being in the field and totally understand that. And I can pick that up in what I read about snowy owls in their research. I can pick up where people making inferences really haven't made a lot of observations to add to their experiences with the bird. They're making inferences off of reading the computer screen. So that's what I mean by you know, boots on the ground. So combining both methodologies is really where I think we should be. And what I try to do with the IL Institute in our direction is to use the technologies of the time that we have to help us unravel questions, but don't forget to go in the field. And so I think what we're seeing now, fast forward, is we're more apt to catch things and attach a transmitter, for example, and then just go to our computer and watch it move around on the screen. Now that gives us a lot of cool insights into certain things. But it also we kind of lean on that more than going out in the field. Where I think by nature we really don't want to be out there in lousy weather, and we don't want to be out there at night doing owl surveys. We don't want to be out in a in a summer blizzard chasing snowy owls and it's freezing, you freeze your butt off and all that. But if you do, you'll realize, hey, there's a lot going on. And what's going on now, too, you know, and I'll shift just a second, but I'll try to come back, you can remind me, is that, you know, we're using these AR units, these automatic automated recording units, putting them in the field to help figure out where some of the owls are. And and that's really cool, and that's helping us. But I'm also emphasizing or forcing, making my crew go out and do traditional playback surveys uh out in the field where you play a call, you have a standardized uh methodology there, and you listen for the awls, you look for the awls. The ARUs are giving us some other information, you know, say, oh, we can't get to the site. If we put up a unit, maybe we can go back in a week and collect it and see if there's any birds calling there because it's going to record it. All good on both ends of it. But what I try to tell the young kids at work for me, by not going out and by only using just the technology instead of combining them, you're missing the whole ecology of the night. I mean, we all know in the daytime, the ecology of life in the daytime. We see it all the time, how animals interact with each other and with the habitats they're in. But there's also winter ecology, and there's also nocturnal ecology. And so we're kind of missing that as well. So that's what I mean by being able to go out in the field. But using both, you know, using the technologies that that we have along with boots in the ground. And I think my generation was maybe because we were in the transition of all these technologies, we were able to easily use both. But I think the newer generations that are out now are a little more technology dependent and a little less field-oriented.

SPEAKER_02 34:34

Okay. So let's talk specifically because you've done the snowy owls for so long, and you've shared with me in other conversations that, you know, one of the great things about owls and specifically about snowy owls is um they motivate people. You know, you talked about eruption years with snowy owls, how people that aren't birders or aren't even really owl fans, but they show up if they have easy access to snowy owls, and how often in conservation efforts, uh, the smartest thing to do is to have an owl be the face of your conservation effort because it motivates people. Um, you know, and so so talk about that. Talk about the impact that owls have on people.

SPEAKER_01 35:20

You know, and I I I use that very often in some of my slide programs or PowerPoint programs now, is what is it about owls? That's kind of the question I lead with. What is it about owls? Why are owls one of the most widely recognized groups of animals in the world and one of the most popular groups of animals in the world? And you can see that if you just look at any historical records of um anywhere, you know, going back to you know, maybe like primitive societies from cave etchings on walls in France of owl families to um you know folklore about owls, you know, written down through the times, to you to you know maybe more modern um talks about owls. What is about? And I think it's it's what they look like. I mean, there's something about what they look like. And it might be a stretch, but I'll say it anyway. You know, they have a big round head like us, they have a relatively flat face like us, they have symmetry of the eyes, the nose, the mouth. Um, and they have some of them have funky hairdo's, you know, if you want to consider tufts and fluffy feathers funky hairdo's, you know. And I I think that that is part of it because we seem to be attracted to animals sometimes with big eyes, sometimes brown eyes. You know, there's a lot of primates in the world, but we're attracted to only certain primates. We say, oh God, what a cool looking face, you know, and those like that. And there's certain animals that attract us, you know, more than other animals. And again, you know, it's probably not the appropriate way to say it, but it's like, you know, good-looking people. Some people are blessed with these looks that everyone looks at them, both men or women, whatever, and you say, Wow, he or she, what a handsome or a pretty person. I mean, and everyone looks at that person. And I think it's the same thing with owls. Most people look at owls and say, wow, that's a cool looking animal over other animals. And I try to say, we can take advantage of these looks and this popularity for conservation. If we use owls in conservation, we may be able to generate more interest. So maybe the lemming in the Arctic might be the most important animal in the ecology of the Arctic. Because when lemmings are having a good year, everything seems to have a good year. You know, all the predators are eating lemmings and they're leaving ground nesting birds alone and all that. When lemmings have a down year, then you know then everything switches to ground nesting birds and eggs and all that stuff. So lemmings may be a better indicator of the health of the Arctic in certain areas, but you can't sell a lemming. You know, you can't sell my friends, I grew up with in Massachusetts. They would say that's a little rat, you know. But they would say, however, that owl's kind of cool looking. And and I would, you know, I would throw money at that owl, I'd throw support and votes for conservation to preserve that owl. But that that little thing you call a lemon, if it's not citrus fruit or anything like that, I'm not, you know, I'm not supporting it. And I think you can the polar bear's another great example of that, you know. Maybe more important to polar bears is sea ice and seals. And maybe they're the better indicator of the health of the Arctic Ocean and stuff. But you probably can't sell ice, you can't, unless it's for drinks, and then you can't sell, um, you probably can't sell seals for the most part, but you can sell a polar bear. And so the polar bear should and is used as mammalian, you know, icon of the Arctic and Arctic sea ice in particular. So shorted owls and grasslands, maybe voles are really important, but you can't sell a vole. You probably can't sell a horned toad, you know, things of that sort, but you could sell a shortered owl, a great gray owl in the forest. You there may be other things that are more important in the forest that don't get as much recognition, but you can't sell it. You stick a great gray owl on there, and people, even people not even wildlife oriented, might say, you know, we should leave some habitat for those big owls. They're kind of cool looking. So that's the whole gist behind us using owls as indicators of healthy environment or to galvanize conservation.

SPEAKER_02 39:31

That makes sense. I mean, I spent my whole career in marketing, and that's what you're talking about is, you know, what's in this case, what's literally the best face to put on on uh the efforts, the various conservation efforts. So 35 years of studying snowy owls, and and 32 or 33 times going up to Barrow to study them, what have you learned and what's changed? You know, have you seen over the three decades that uh behaviorally they've changed as a result of whatever climate change or our being involved with them, or or is it the same now as it was 32, 33 years ago?

SPEAKER_01 40:13

Well, I think the behaviors are the same in that sense. You know, you go to a nest and there's individual variation, but they all do the same thing. They bark, they scream, they attack, they don't, you know. So that that that part, I don't think I could say that I've detected any changes if there are any. Um but the nesting numbers uh uh in the Arctic, uh in my study area, so I can only speak from my study area, uh have clearly changed. It all happened around two about 2010. I was just looking at the figures. I gave a Zoom talk the other night to some group, and I was just looking at the the graphs that we had. In about 2010, you know, the numbers just the steady decline started to happen. And it's just, you know, the trend line is just significantly downward. Before we had population fluctuations, you know, and and that was okay, you know, and some years you had a high year, and some years you had a low year, and then you had a high year, then you had a low year, and there was always some variability, but it it always occurred and didn't occur in you know cycles as uh as some people think. It didn't occur in predictable cycles, but nonetheless it occurred and showed patterns. Uh but about 2010, I I I don't know, you know. I mean, I I know the default answer to everything is you know climate change. Uh lemmings, however, they they seem to have remained a little stable, maybe a slight decline, but it didn't seem to match, even though it's highly correlated, when there's a high lemon year, it's a high owl year, but the decline in the lemmings didn't really seem to be as dramatic. It was actually even if not, maybe it's a little trending downward. Whereas in the owls, it's a it's a steady decline downward. So I don't know. I I don't know the answer to that. I don't want to just say it's climate change um without convincing evidence, you know, just to say it's climate change. Um and we don't have that convincing evidence yet. We're trying to get there. We're we're we're looking at, you know, weather patterns, snowfall, and all that in relation to the owls, but you know, we also have to look at in relation to the lemmings. There's been some people who have studied the lemmings throughout the Arctic who say that there's no real decline with varying um winter weather. And but there's others who say local declines are happening. And so I don't know what's more important throughout the world uh declines or local declines. So that's one of the things we started seeing in 2010, and the trend is is definitely downward, significantly downward, but given the way lemming numbers can fluctuate, it only takes one good year to go from zero or five Ness to 35 Ness and bring that trend lined up. So that I keep waiting for that. It hasn't happened in a while. I think 2019 might have been the last decent year. Um, but I keep waiting for that trend line. So that is definitely there. But at the same time, Scott, when I look at our graphs and I see, okay, this was a significant down year. What the heck happened? Only five snowy owl nests. Because of the aerial surveys that some people do uh across the Arctic coastal plain, they have been counting the snowy owls since the late 80s, I think it is. And they'll say, hey, we had someone will call me up. We found there's 50 snowy owl nests 300 miles from you that we wouldn't have picked up had they not done these surveys. And that's happened a couple times. So when the owls at Barrow look like they're declining, are the owls declining, their population totally declining? I don't know the answer to that. Some people think they've declined by thirty percent. Worldwide. I don't know how we come to all these numbers. Um, you know, I I'm definitely an advocate for snowy owl conservation, but sometimes I just wonder how we come up with, you know, some of the numbers that we come up with.

SPEAKER_02 44:13

So in addition to boots on the ground, Denver, you you talk a lot about the value of long-term studies. Would this be an example of that where you've got 35 years of data in a single location and the number of nests and the number of owls and the number of lemmings? Whereas if I just went out, you talk you've spoken, again, respectfully, but you've spoken about graduate students that go out maybe one season or two seasons. They can't possibly know what the trends are. They have no idea what the snowy owl population was in 2020 or 2010 or 2000. Um, is is that where we start to get into the value of the long-term studies that we're not just doing the same study every year for 35 years. We're learning the differences. And you're talking about the relationship between the number of lemmings and another of snowy owls. I know in some of the reading I've done, people just assume that those two things are linked. Absolutely. That if lemmings go down, snowies go down, if lemmings go up, snowies go up. But you have numbers that you know that can highlight that or contradict it.

SPEAKER_01 45:24

Yeah, one of the examples I use actually is I use two examples of our long-term studies. One's on snowy owls and the other's on long-eared owls. And we have it's about 35 years on snowies and 37 years on long-years. And if you look at the graphs and the nesting numbers, and so you know, clearly there's population fluctuations. Now if you look at specific you know, dates within within our graphs, for example, and you were, you know, a a a student, and I and I don't want to be little students because we need to train them. But we also need to be skeptical of you know of some of the work. But uh and I as I say for snowy owls, I think it was maybe from 2000 to 2005. I said, if I was a typical graduate student, I point this out on the graph, I would say, oh my gosh, you know, something's wrong. There's hardly any snowy owls here. All right. And then in 2006 it goes like this. So we have five years of below, and your typical graduate studies one to three seasons, maybe four. And so it went high in 2006, down in 2007, high again in 2008, and then down again. So depending on what you know sequence or number of years or blocks of years that you studied, you might come to different conclusions. So if I studied it as a typical graduate study, you know, in the early 2001, two, three, let's say, I would say, oh gosh, there's no snowy owls around. If I study them from 2006 to 2008, I'd say, geez, the snowy owls are doing great. If I studied them for 30 something years, I would say, Oh, the populations fluctuate over time, but then in about 2010, things started going down. And and that's the value of the long-term research. You can see the the trend with the longer knowledge is very, very similar. If I was to study them in this block of time, I may conclude this uh or have this conclusion. Everything's good. If I study them in this block of time, I would say, oh, there's not many around, you know, we're maybe they should be listed for this, this, and that. If I was to study them for 37 years, I would see the trend line is straight. Some years there's a bunch, other years is very few. But over time in our study area, and again, you don't want to extrapolate too far, in our study area, uh everything seems to be looking good other than this population fluctuations.

SPEAKER_02 47:58

Well, I I think it's fascinating, and I have to I just have to share this experience because while you've done it for 37 years and I did it for two days, excuse me. Um I did it for two days. Um Denver did invite me out, and I went out to Mission Valley, Montana, and I spent a couple of days working with Denver and his team, uh, doing some of the long-eared studies, uh, long-eared owl stuff, and we set up Miss Nets and captured a couple, one that had been captured previously, and and one that was a first-time capture. And it is a it is a fascinating thing to be a part of, and to see Denver, you know, at 70 years old, out there beating the brush and giving orders and directions giving orders and directions to people less than half his age. Um, and you know, my whole job was to squat and and not screw anything up, and I I managed to do that, I think. Um, but it was just to me, it was amazing to be out there and to see that kind of to see that kind of field work, to to be a part of it just for a couple of days, and and to get to hold a long-eared owl and get to release a long-eared owl and and to watch as they weigh and measure and sex and and do all these things. And then Denver was showing me some of the handwritten notebooks that you know have this information in it. And there is there is a value to that that that can't be measured by a computer. And and it can't be measured by somebody looking at a computer. And again, no disrespect. To your point, Denver, you you really having both is is the critical part. But literally having my boots on the ground and watching you and your team was fascinating and added to well, to my life experiences. Um it just it just made a difference in in the way that I view and I see things. So for that I say thank you. And for the 37 years of studying, I think I think in your in your research you you've marked 2,000 long-eared owls over the years. Over yeah, over a couple thousand, yeah. Yeah. And I'll I'll throw some pictures up because there's, you know, we caught a male and he's got a spray-painted blue ear, and and then we caught a female that had never been caught before. And and again, for those of you that are raptor fans or birders, and I think what Denver's doing is important, whether you're into birding or into grizzly bears or you're into butterflies. But if you love birds and you love raptors specifically, you have got to get out to Mission Valley, Montana in the winter. Um massive density of birds of prey that winter out there. And I've been there a few times, and it is fascinating every single time. It is just a blessing to be out there. This was an extra special treat, um, but it is every time. Uh Denver, another another bird that fascinates birders and especially people who love owls, are northern hawk owls. And I think you've got uh a two-decade project going there as well, don't you?

SPEAKER_01 51:07

Yeah, we're done on that. Um we did it in Glacier Park in conjunction with uh Steve Ganidak, um retired uh biologist for Glacier National Park. And we, yeah, I can't believe we have 20-something years of data. Um, but you know, our sample sizes are relatively small. Uh, you know, we only found we found evidence of about 35 nests, and we found the actual nest maybe 17, 18 times, uh banded a whole bunch of adults and young. So you put two decades into this roughly, plus or minus, for really little results. You know, I mean it still contributes to our knowledge. And um yeah, it contributes to our knowledge, but it's it's it's a hell of a lot of work. And you know, I've had good crews go up there and you know and and really bust their butts getting out there cross-country skiing and and doing surveys in the daytime, following it up and trying to find nest sites, and so yes, we have uh a pretty pretty good sample. Not huge like we like, but it's it's remote areas. You can't take snowmobiles in there, you're gonna cross-country ski, and you gotta hike, and and it's a lot of snow and it's dangerous in some areas and excuse me, all that stuff. So so yes is the answer. But can I digress real quick? Can I digress to one thing? When you said about the blue painting. Of course you can. The blue spray paint on the long ear owls is well, we didn't use spray paint, we used a little magic marker. And uh and we just colored the left, or not the left, but the one of the tufts, the the white feather off one of the ear tufts, so we can know individuals. And the reason we did that, getting back to boots on the ground, how boots in the ground lead you into sometimes really neat pioneering questions. And we wanted to know, we have live cameras on the winter roofs, and so sometimes you can see five, ten, fifteen, twenty long-eared owls all sitting next to each other in the roof sites, and we're like, wow, okay, so we have the general ornithological theory of why you know be communal roofs is there information exchange going on, or what what else is what's going on in the communal roofs? Do they learn from each other and all that? So we wanted to know, okay, within the communal roofs, if these two are sitting next to each other and and this one's out front and this one's in the back, is there some hierarchy to how they're arranged? Are the dominant ones in the interior, the less dominant ones outside, more susceptible to predation? Are males and females in there? Are certain age classes in there? And so by being inquisitive, by being boots on the ground, by capturing and banning, and then using live cameras to help us on the roof sites, leads to these questions, and then we try to develop methods for answering our questions.

SPEAKER_02 54:05

Well, I I think it's fascinating, and I I thoroughly enjoyed the the experience and the learning. And thanks for clarifying. I I could only imagine how many emails I was gonna get that you're out there with cans of spray paint. Oh, yeah, you know how someone will twist that, you know. Yeah, absolutely. Oh, so Holtz out there spray painting owls. That's that's what he calls boots on the ground. And by the way, if you don't know, and not everybody does, but if you don't know, the ear tufts on the short ear and long-eared owls are not actually ears the way that we think they are. If we're looking at a cat or a deer or a dog, the ears are are down in the dish and roughly parallel with the eyes. The tufts, so what what is the purpose then of the tufts, Denver? Other than giving you something to color mark.

SPEAKER_01 54:54

Yeah, it's uh it's all yeah, they give us something to color mark, but you know, the theory is that that they just you know maybe help in camouflage, you know. If you watch the owls, and again, this is where the cameras are very helpful. If you watch the owls when there's no one around and they're just roosting by day, the tufts are you know, they're semi-erected, they're kind of more relaxed. And then if you walk in there, you can watch them change their posture and raise their tufts up, get compress their bodies, and so we we think it just enhances uh their camouflage ability, maybe to look like twigs. And you know, early naturalists and early bird watchers have suggested a lot of this stuff years ago, and we're just kind of adding to that body of knowledge, you know, and and they put their eyebrows up and they put up the rictal bristles around the bill, and they kind of change that 3D look to more of a two-dimensional look. You have disruptive patterning with the white going down through the body. So that's what we think it's for. And the camouflage, I think, I don't know if you remember seeing that when we looked at the camouflage on the back and compared to the tail that day when we were out there, and we said the central two tail feathers match the back. The others don't. They don't have to because they're under the central two tail feathers. So we learn all these little subtle things about just you know the evolution, the evolutionary adaptations in owls, and and it's just by being out there handling, watching, making observations, seeking up questions. How do you go about answering some of these questions?

SPEAKER_02 56:20

Well, Denver, thank you very much for for being in the book, for being on the podcast, for inviting me out there, um, and most importantly for the work that you're doing, and for the time we're gonna spend in Barrow, Alaska. You see how I work that in there a second time. Well, I hope you come up there. Well, I absolutely I absolutely will. There's just these opportunities present themselves. You gotta grab them. So I'm gonna throw my email up. Uh, if you're not watching on YouTube, it's Scott at naturaliscott.com. If you've got questions for me or for Denver, send them and uh I'll make sure Denver gets the questions. I'll put Denver's URL up there for the Owl Research Institute so that if you are in love with owls and you want to support the work that Denver and his team are doing, that would be great and much appreciated. Um, and um Denver, as I ask all of my guests um at the end of uh an hour that once again goes by painfully fast, um what book would you recommend to the audience that you think they might enjoy? Anything nature conservation-based um that uh that you want to share with uh with the listeners and the viewers?

SPEAKER_01 57:31

Well, I I think that um you know I do a fair amount of reading, and I think that Jennifer Ackerman's book, who came out maybe two years ago now, What an Owl Knows, and was on the New York Times bestseller, I think she did a really, really good job of bringing together, you know, the science, if I can use that word, behind owl research and owl conservation, and uh and presented it in a way that you know all of us can understand, going back from you know medieval days and you know the Paleolithic times of cave paintings up to present-day molecular stuff, and she brings it all together really, really nicely, and then just the whole awe about owls is always present in each chapter. And so um, Jennifer Ackerman, I actually have it right here. So if anyone wants to see it, What an Owl Knows by Jennifer Ackerman, New York Times bestselling. And uh I think that's one of the if you really want to get a pretty good handle on owls without having to read scientific literature, then I think that's the place to go. I mean, I was really impressed with it.

SPEAKER_02 58:37

Well, fantastic. That is high praise indeed. And uh hopefully a few people will pick that book up as a result of having seen this. Hey, if you're listening to us, thank you very much for doing that. If you happen to be watching us on YouTube, we appreciate that too. Reach over and hit subscribe. Um, as you'll notice, there's no ads in this thing, there's no money being made. This is all a labor of love. Um, but every time somebody subscribes, YouTube pushes out Denver's message and other messages to more people and allows me to bring in more guests. I really, really appreciate it when you do that. It takes you about 10 seconds. You know, and if you want to drop a comment or hit like, even better, you know, we appreciate that. Denver, and this is once again, this has been a learning experience for me. I am grateful to you for the work that you've done and the time that you've given me um over just the short few months we've known each other. So for that, thank you very much.

SPEAKER_01 59:32

Thanks, thank you, and and thanks for the opportunity to tell a little bit about you know what we do, what the ISU does, and a little bit about my story, you know.

SPEAKER_02 59:41

But uh that's we're gonna have to have you back on because we didn't talk about the National Geographic cover. We didn't talk about your beautiful home, the address, which I won't give out, but I will tell you it is a stunning home. Um that uh if I could sneak in and live there without him knowing, that's what I would do. Um but for everybody, I encourage you at the end of these shows to get outside, whether that's your back porch or your backyard or your local patch or Barrow, Alaska, get outside and see and feel and touch everything you can. And when you do, stay safe and stay curious. Have a great day, everybody. In Denver, one last time. Thank you.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:23

Thank you, Scott. Really appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:27

You've been listening to Naturally Scott with Scott Harris. Naturally Scott is hosted by Scott Harris, produced by Justin Harris, directed and edited by Frank Sierra. Follow us on our YouTube channel at Naturally Scott and Instagram at naturally Scott Harris. If this conversation resonated with you, please follow the show, leave a review, and share it with someone who needs to hear it. Naturally Scott thanks you for viewing and listening to this podcast.