A snowy owl has settled in Orange County, California, delighting local residents and befuddling bird experts, who are wondering how it ended up there. The raptor, accustomed to the arctic, showed up in Cypress, about 25 miles from Los Angeles, a few weeks ago. “It’s like seeing Santa Claus on a beach,” Nancy Caruso, a marine biologist, told The New York Times. “Like that out of place, but cool.” While snowy owls do travel southward in winter, it’s extremely rare to see one near southern California, said Lori Arent of the University of Minnesota’s Raptor Center.
