Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Units Program: Idaho
Education, Research and Technical Assistance for Managing Our Natural Resources

Western burrowing owls (Athene cunicularia hypugaea) are declining or have disappeared from many portions of their historic breeding range. The decline of burrowing owl populations is often attributed to conversion of native grasslands to agriculture and urban development, and to declines in abundance of burrowing mammals that the owls rely on for creation of nest burrows. Burrowing owls are relatively well studied during the breeding season but relatively little is known about their ecology after breeding. Some burrowing owls move to a distinct post-breeding home range before they migrate (post-breeding movement) where they spend approximately 2.5 months of their annual cycle. We have been working with numerous cooperators to attach satellite transmitters to 280 burrowing owls in the U.S. and Canada over the past 11 years which enables us document movements and resource selection of burrowing owls after they leave the breeding grounds. The transmitters also allow us to document daily survival probabilities across the owl’s annual cycle. The objectives of this project are: 1) thoroughly describe post-breeding movements of migrating burrowing owls, 2) investigate why some burrowing owls make a post-breeding movement prior to migration while others do not, 3) document resources burrowing owls select during migration, and 4) identify factors that influence survival. The results of this project will help ensure that management efforts that target burrowing owls do not neglect to consider post-breeding and migration life stages where knowledge is currently lacking.