Are Snowy Owls Endangered? Status, Numbers and Threats

Snowy owl conservation status at a glance

Why the snowy owl was uplisted to Vulnerable

For decades, the world population of the snowy owl was put at more than 200,000 birds. That figure, however, was based on rough calculations: researchers took densities from good lemming years at a few study sites and multiplied them across the whole Arctic.

In the 2010s, new work using satellite tracking, genetic studies and long-term monitoring showed that this approach had greatly overestimated the population. The same owls were being counted in different places in different years, because snowy owls move hundreds of kilometers between breeding attempts. Potapov and Sale (2013) estimated the world population at perhaps 28,000 breeding pairs or fewer, and in poor lemming years the number of nesting females across the Arctic may be only a few thousand.

At the same time, monitoring in North America suggested steep declines. Partners in Flight estimated that North American snowy owl numbers fell by about 64% between 1970 and 2014. A small population falling fast meets the IUCN criteria for Vulnerable, so in 2017 the species was uplisted.

Why snowy owls are so hard to count

Snowy owls are among the most difficult birds in the world to census:

• Remote breeding grounds. They nest across millions of square kilometers of Arctic tundra that few people ever visit.
• Nomadic breeding. Owls settle wherever lemmings are abundant that year, so a site full of nests one summer may be empty the next.
• Skipped breeding. In poor lemming years many adults do not nest at all.
• Scattered winter range. In winter they spread across prairies, coasts and sea ice from Alaska to Russia.

Counting them reliably needs coordinated work across countries. The International Snowy Owl Working Group, Project SNOWstorm and other research teams use satellite tags and shared surveys to understand where owls go and how many there really are. Learn more about their movements in Where do snowy owls live?

What threatens snowy owls?

Climate change and lemmings. Snowy owls depend on lemmings to breed successfully. Lemmings need deep, dry snow in winter, where they live and breed in the space between the ground and the snowpack. Warmer winters with thaws and rain can create ice layers that damage this habitat and disrupt the regular lemming peaks. In northeast Greenland, a collapse in lemming numbers since the late 1990s was followed by a dramatic fall in snowy owl breeding success.

Collisions. Many snowy owls die by flying into vehicles, aircraft, fences, wires and windows, especially young birds in their first winter. In one study of 71 dead owls found in winter on the northern Great Plains, 86% had died from trauma such as collisions, electrocution or shooting, and only 14% from starvation.

Airports. Snowy owls are drawn to the open grassland around runways. After snowy owls were shot at New York airports in December 2013, public protest led authorities to favor capturing and relocating owls instead. At Boston’s Logan Airport, owls have been trapped and moved away safely for decades.

Shooting and hunting. Snowy owls were once shot widely for sport and taxidermy. Today they are protected in most of their range, but illegal shooting still occurs, and some traditional hunting continues in parts of the Arctic.

Disturbance. Wintering owls that are repeatedly flushed by photographers or dogs waste energy at the hardest time of year.

Are snowy owls endangered in Europe?

In Europe, snowy owls are rare breeders found mainly in the far north of Norway, Sweden, Finland and Arctic Russia, and in many years few or none nest in Fennoscandia. They are protected throughout the region. The species once bred in Shetland, Scotland, from 1967 to 1975, but it is now only an occasional winter visitor to Britain.

How does the snowy owl compare with other Arctic animals?

The snowy owl is one of several Arctic species whose status has been reconsidered as the far north warms quickly. The Arctic fox, which also depends on lemmings in much of its range, is still listed as Least Concern worldwide, although some populations are in serious trouble; see Are Arctic foxes endangered? For an overview of life in the far north, see our list of Arctic animals.

What is being done to help?

Protection under national laws and CITES has largely ended legal sport hunting and commercial trade. Researchers are now filling the gaps in knowledge, tracking owls across the Arctic and studying how lemming cycles respond to climate change. At airports, capture-and-release programs reduce collisions without killing owls, and birding groups promote responsible viewing so wintering owls can rest and feed. The long-term future of the snowy owl, though, is tied to the future of the Arctic itself.