On Pause: Burrowing Owls

Pausing for today from my series on "5" Star Photos, I wanted to share with you my success in finding Burrowing Owls. 

Normally, I look at the ABA.Org birding news for Arizona/New Mexico everyday just to see what's going on. But occasionally there is a bird sighting that makes me jump in the car and head out to that site. Yesterday was such a day. There was a post about Yellow Billed Cuckoos in Empire Gulch, Las Cienegas, Arizona (about 50 minutes from here). It was such an inviting post:

"In the lower gulch where there is almost always standing water, we were treated to exceptional views of several YELLOW-BILLED CUCKOOs, completely in the open and of long duration. In fact, from the parking area to where the water comes to the surface, we likely saw 5-7 cuckoos."

Yesterday, I spent several hours in the Gulch but no Yellow Billed Cuckoos. Such is often the case when looking for a specific bird that someone had seen the day before. One of the things I've realized over the years of "birding" is that  ......  and this is really key:   birds have "wings!"  

However, just a week ago there was a post about Burrowing Owls at the Safelite Autoglass Corporate Headquarters near the Tucson International Airport. This too, made me jump in the car and go take a look. But, this time it was successful. In all, I saw six Burrowing Owls. Here are a few of those photos:

Burrowing Owl standing just in front of a storm drain in the parking lot.

Just across the street from the corporate office is another building with hearts  painted on the  walls. Here were three Burrowing Owls sitting on the fence in front of a heart. Had to be worth a photo.

A close-up of one as he began to "fly away"

Burrowing Owl near his escape route.