Logan International Airport under snowfall – credit CC 2.5 Daniel Schwen (left) and a snowy owl – credit, CC 3.0. Sara

A bird lover has been rescuing and relocating snowy owls from the Boston airport for over a decade, ensuring 900 of these majestic hunters can return home after winter.

The star of a recent award-winning documentary, Norman Smith, a raptor specialist at the Massachusetts Audubon Society, says it’s been an incredible experience to learn about these birds since he pulled the first one off the runway in 1981.

Logan Interntional Airport (BOS) is no stranger to snow, nor the owls of the same name that most people would associate with the Arctic. The reality is that BOS shares many similarities to their Arctic homes.

“It looks very much like the Arctic tundra,” Smith told CBS Boston. “It’s short, very short, mowed grass like it is in the Arctic. It’s surrounded on three side by water, so there’s plenty of food on the airport.”

A threat to an airplane and vice-versa, the awkward fact is that the five islands which make up East Boston contain the highest concentrations of snowy owls in the American northeast. They migrate here from the Arctic to spend the winter.

Many are attracted by the airport’s similarities to home, as Smith explained, but aside from a turbine engine, there are plenty of other hazards for them to face. One mature female had her feathers burned off after landing on a snow melter. Electrocutions and collisions with fences are other dangers.

If an owl becomes thusly injured, Smith will help transport them to the Blue Hills Trailside Museum in Milton, where they can undergo rehabilitation before Smith releases them back into wilder areas.

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The ones unable to be released are available for locals to see up close at the Mass Audubon property.

The Snowy Owls of Logan Airport, a documentary produced and directed by Anna Miller, recently won the Audience Choice Award at the American Conversation Film Festival.

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“It’s been an incredible experience to learn about these birds and see what they do, where they go, and how long they might live,” Smith said. “Together we can better understand, appreciate and care for the world in which we live.”

WATCH the documentary below… 

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