On April 8th, 2010 was when I caught my first glimpse of an Elf Owl in the wild, where this one was photographed by Santa Rita Lodge in Madera Canyon. I was birding with my friend Jim Kopitzke, and we waited by Santa Rita, which is a tradional Elf Owl spot. I spied the owl, and Jim and I were able to show the crowd of birders the owl under good lighting from the flashlight. Unfortunetely, a leaf got in the way of giving me good shots for this bird, but still a great memory.
A few hours later, we were still owling around Madera, counting seven individual Elf Owls throughout the area, including looks at another one. One even called loudly directly above our tent.
