Due to their secretive nature and nocturnal habits, owls are not well-monitored by other programs such as the Breeding Bird Survey and Christmas Bird Counts. The Atlantic Canada Nocturnal owl survey was initiated in 2001 with the following goals:

• monitoring trends in abundances of relatively common owls (Barred Owl, Great-horned Owl and Northern Saw-whet Owl)
• gathering information about the distribution of owls in Atlantic Canada
• involving the public in actively monitoring the region’s owl populations.

Participants run their owl survey route once per year, during any evening from April 1st to May 15th. Each route takes approximately 2.5 to 3 hours to complete, and consists of 10 stops spaced 2 km (NB and PEI) or 1.6 km (NS) apart.

If you are a registered participant and would like to enter your data online, you must create a login name and password. If you already have a login name, you can log in the site.

For more information on the Atlantic Canada Nocturnal Owl Survey, or to find out where you may be able to help, contact us or visit http://www.birdscanada.org/volunteer/atowls/.