Northern Hawk Owl
(Surnia ulula)

Overview

Summary

© Jukka Jantunen
For additional photos and vocalizations, visit Dendroica. (Link opens in a new window.)

The Northern Hawk Owl breeds across the circumpolar northern latitudes. In Canada, it breeds north to the treeline and is most abundant in open boreal forests. Its use of remote and inaccessible breeding habitats means that the Northern Hawk Owl is poorly monitored in Canada, though results from the Christmas Bird Count suggest that populations have undergone a large increase relative to about 1970. A large fraction of the species' range lies north of intensive commercial logging, in areas with comparatively few anthropogenic threats. This species has been identified as a priority for conservation and/or stewardship in one or more Bird Conservation Region Strategies in Canada.

Designations

Population status

Population estimate

Distribution maps

• BirdLife International / NatureServe

Migration strategy, occurrence

Responsibility for conservation of world population

Conservation and management

Although the species is a boreal forest specialist, it is believed to be comparatively resilient to logging. More than 50% of the species' range lies north of areas subjected to commercial timber harvest (Duncan and Duncan 1998), and the species may in fact benefit from increased small mammal abundance and more open habitat made with some logging prescriptions (Sonerud 1997).

Bird conservation region strategies

Environment and Climate Change Canada and partners have developed Bird Conservation Region Strategies in each of Canada’s Bird Conservation Regions (BCRs). In these strategies, selected species are identified as priorities for one or more of the following reasons:

• conservation concerns (i.e., species vulnerable due to population size, distribution, population trend, abundance, or threats)
• stewardship responsibilities (i.e., species that typify the regional avifauna or have a large proportion of their range or population in the sub-region)
• management concerns (i.e., species that require ongoing management because of their socio-economic importance as game species, or because of their impacts on other species or habitats)
• other concerns (i.e., species deemed a priority by regional experts for other reasons than those listed above or because they are listed as species at risk or concern at the provincial level)

Select any of the sub-regions below to view the BCR strategy for additional details.

References

• Duncan, J.R. and P.A. Duncan. 1998. Northern Hawk Owl (Surnia ulula),The Birds of North America Online (A. Poole, Ed.). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. Duncan, J.R. and P.A. Duncan. 1998. Northern Hawk Owl (Surnia ulula),The Birds of North America Online (A. Poole, Ed.). Cornell Lab of Ornithology, Ithaca, New York. (Link)
• Sonerud, G.A. 1997. Hawk Owls in Fennoscandia: Population fluctuations, effects of modern forestry, and recommendations on improving foraging habitats. Journal of Raptor Research 31:167-174.