Snowy Loon Rescue in Lake Placid
A juvenile loon that came to be called “Spunky Snow-Wing” finds itself stranded in some snow around Brewster Peninsula in Lake Placid. Photo by Dr. Nina Schoch.
Friday morning started off like a typical day…busy as ever trying to get things done before heading into work, and letting it warm up a bit from single digits before I did the outside chores. However, suddenly my phone rang and Fred Rimen, who had been plowing snow on the road to the Brewster Peninsula trails in Lake Placid, told me he had found a loon wailing in the road.
I quickly collected our loon capture gear and met him on the road, along with Matt Colby, a retired head driver with the Lake Placid Fire Dept. In the meantime, the loon had wing-rowed up the road and into some deep snow in a yard, still wailing repeatedly. I gave Fred the net and had him go around the bird to block it from going further towards the woods. The plan was that the loon would be distracted by Fred and the net, then I could sneak up behind it and toss a towel over it from the back to catch it.
A path from the juvenile loon wing-rowing through the snow. Photo by Dr. Nina Schoch.
The bird had other plans though – it figured out very quickly that there was a second person behind it, and it whipped around and came wing-rowing right at me, ready to attack! I quickly tossed the towel over its head and placed it in the special net-bottom bin designed to protect loons from injuring their keels during transport.
I took it back to the Loon Center, where Griffin Archambault, our biologist, and I examined it while Dorothy Waldt, our new Executive Director, learned to hold her first loon, an amazing experience! This juvenile was in very good condition, so Griffin, Marissa McLean, our intern from SUNY Cortland, and I banded it and took it over to Lake Champlain to release it on open water. The loon couldn’t resist attacking Griffin one more time as he released it. Then it realized it was back on water and took off! It wing-rowed as fast as it could, as far away from us as it could get, almost out of eyesight. It stopped to flap its wings, which almost all rescued loons do at release to get their feathers back in normal position after being ruffled during the exam and banding.
We’ve rescued four other juveniles over the last few weeks who had been iced-in. Sometimes, juvenile loons haven’t figured out they need to migrate, and end up staying too long in the Adirondacks. Then the winter weather sets in, and they get iced-in or blown down in a storm before they can fly to the coast.
New executive director Dorothy Waldt holds the loon while ACLC research biologist Griffin Archambault takes measurements. Photo by Aaron Marbone.
The feisty juvenile loon takes a bite out of Griffin Archambault while being released. No research biologists were seriously harmed. Photo by Ellie George.
The loon moves quickly after realizing it’s free again. Photo by Ellie George.
Rescuing and banding loons in the Adirondacks provides so much information about their migratory patterns, lifespan and survival, and site fidelity to the area where they hatched. Many of the loons we band have been re-sighted in their wintering areas along the East Coast (some birds multiple times over multiple years), as well as in their breeding territories in subsequent summers. It’s so exciting to know that a bird we rescued from such problems as being iced-in, grounded, or from fishing line entanglement, has since survived for years and successfully raised chicks.
To learn more about, or support, the loon conservation efforts of the Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation, visit www.adkloon.org or the Adirondack Loon Center at 75 Main St. in Saranac Lake. Thank you to Aaron Marbone for coverage of this rescue in the Adirondack Daily Enterprise.
by Dr. Nina Schoch, ACLC Director of Conservation and Science