on top of old Smoky

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Sometimes, just knowing they are there is enough.

Yes. I know Northern saw-whet owls live and nest on the top of Old Smoky, but they are secretive and I’ve never been up there at the right season, or right time of the day or in the right conditions to hear one. So for that matter, they might as well nest on the moon.

Dr. Fred Alsop knows the issues. He writes in his Birds of the Smokies, “The peak of singing activity is from the first week of April through the third week of May.”

“Weather conditions seem to be a major factor influencing singing, with most vocalizations coming on clear nights with little or no wind. Rain, fog, low clouds, and other inclement conditions make the chances of hearing this owl almost zero.”

If you know the higher elevations of the Smokies, you know that inclement conditions are a daily occurrence, things change hourly, clouds move in, clouds move out. Perfect conditions are never a guarantee. 

Alsop continues, “I have found from one to eleven birds singing in a single night between Newfound Gap and Clingmans Dome, although there have been many nights when I heard none, even though all the conditions seemed right.”

So, it’s a long way to drive with no guarantee of hearing a single saw-whet.

Still, here we were in Gatlinburg the last weekend in May with nothing on our day-planner. Should we roll the dice? Was a saw-whet in our future, waiting?

After watching the sunset from an overlook, we moved on to Indian Gap on the Clingmans Dome Road and waited in the grass, as the evening grew dark. Conditions seemed right.

Then it came from down the trail to the left of Mt. Collins: “whot-whot-whot-whot-whot.” Mechanical. Eerie. Monotonous. Otherworldly. Unmistakable. And the darker the night ebbed, the closer the little hooter moved up the mountain and our impromptu bivouac.

Yes. Sometimes, just knowing it’s there is enough, but sometimes it's not. 

On this night we got lucky. Sometimes you do.

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