Rare appearance of white snowy owl in Los Angeles suburb attracts sightseers

AP

A snowy winter owl, typically seen in northern Canada and the Arctic Circle, has landed in the unlikeliest of places: Orange County.

The bird, made famous by the Harry Potter franchise, was spotted in the suburban town of Cypress and has drawn crowds for a potentially once-in-a-life time look.

The snowy winter owl does often migrate from the Arctic and Canada to several states in the northern US during the winter, and has on occasion been seen in Florida and Texas, but not in southern California. This particular owl, however, was reportedly first seen in San Pedro in November before it made its way to Cypress.

It is not entirely clear why the bird, believed to be an adult female or young male, ended up in outside Los Angeles. The area is currently experiencing abnormally cool and rainy weather, but was not when the bird first reportedly arrived.

Bird watchers and photographers gather on a street in Cypress, California, to see a snowy owl as it perches on the top of a chimney of a home (AP)

Of the many people who have flocked to Cypress to see the bird perched on various neighbourhood rooftops between the hours of 6am and 4pm each day, bird enthusiasts are among the most excited.

“It’s a beautiful thing to see,” one such enthusiast, Vic Leipzig, a birding instructor at Saddleback College, told the Orange County Register last month.

“That there were so many people standing there watching this thing was very thrilling to me. And not just people, as I expected, who had traveled long distances, but folks from the neighborhood as well.”