A birder took a photo of this snowy owl on the North Spit recently. On Sunday, a birder discovered the bird dead. It had been shot. Snowy owls are rare visitors to the Oregon Coast, with the last one having been seen on the North Spit nine years ago. Contributed Photo by Russ Namitz

They trek out onto Coos Bay’s North Spit loaded down with spotting scopes, binoculars and bird books.

Coos Bay resident Tim Rodenkirk is probably one of the most recognizable birders. It’s not uncommon to see his tall lanky form walking down the trail next to Weyerhaeuser Company’s former effluent pond. He’s there all the time.

On Saturday, Rodenkirk wasn’t ogling the usual shorebirds or scoping for rare sparrows. It was a rare snowy owl that drew his interest. He was with fellow birder Barbara Griffin of North Bend.

“It was mittens and hat weather, and windy and cold,” Griffin recalled Wednesday.

Perfect owling weather.

They hiked halfway out the dike road toward the beach and looked out across the terrain. There it was.

Brilliant white. Large. And captivating.

“This one was spectacular. People from all over were excited about it,” Rodenkirk said.

He told one of his coworkers. She and her young son, a Harry Potter fan, were planning to trek out to see it. (Harry Potter’s owl, Hedwig, in the book series, is a snowy owl.)

Saturday, as Rodenkirk and Griffin watched, the bird moved around — in daylight, since snowy owls are diurnal.

Rodenkirk was so intrigued with the owl, he returned Sunday morning around 8:30. He soon spotted it, but it wasn’t moving.

It was dead.

Someone had shot it.

“It’s just a real tragedy,” Rodenkirk said Wednesday.

He took the bird to Bandon to Free Flight Bird and Mammal Rehabilitation Center, which had the owl autopsied.

The bird died from a lead pellet.

The shot went through its wing, penetrated its chest and exited out the other side.

Rodenkirk is dubious any shooter will ever get caught. Still, it’s illegal to shoot a snowy owl. In fact, owls and all but a couple wild bird species in the United States are protected by the Migratory Bird Treaty Act. That means it’s illegal to kill birds except during scheduled hunting seasons, with the punishment for violation being at least a $15,000 fine and up to six months in jail. It also bans anyone from capturing birds, buying, selling, feather collecting and other activities.

But for Rodenkirk and other birders, the bigger issue is the loss to the community of a rare bird species that many people could have gone to see.

“People from Central California wanted to come up. There was people from all over that would have come to see this bird,” he said.

That’s the way birders are.