The young loon was rescued from neck-deep snow on the ground in Lake Placid and released onto the open waters of Lake Champlain in Westport.

The loon was discovered Friday morning on the road to the Peninsula Trails in Lake Placid by snowplow drivers.

ACLC Conservation and Science Director Nina Schoch was doing chores and getting ready to go into the office when plowman Fred Ryman called her. He had been plowing snow on the road along with Matt Colby when they found the loon wailing in the road.

By the time Schoch arrived, the loon had wing-rowed down the road, trying to walk in the deep snow by pushing off its wings, leaving unique prints in the powder.

Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation intern Marissa McLean, from SUNY Cortland, holds a loon rescued from a road in Lake Placid on Friday in a parking lot in Saranac Lake as ACLC Biologist Griffin Archambault measures the bird’s beak. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

Loons cannot take off on land. They can only get airborne from the water. Loons’ legs are further back on their bodies than other waterfowl, making them great swimmers, but requiring a long, watery runway to take off. While they are grounded, they are easy prey for aerial and ground predators.

The loon made its way into a yard and was neck-deep in snow powder.

Schoch hatched a plan. She gave Ryman a net and had him go around the bird to block it from going further towards the woods. She hoped Ryman would distract the loon so she could sneak up behind it and toss a towel over it from the back to catch it. The loon was not injured, but it didn’t get put in custody without a fight.

“The bird had other plans though,” Schoch wrote in an email. “It figured out very quickly that there was a second person behind it, and it whipped around and came wing-rowing right at me, ready to attack!”

She was able to toss the towel over its head and secure it. The loon was placed in a special net-bottom bin designed to protect loons from injuring their keels during transport.

Odd prints in the snow were left by a loon who landed on a road in Lake Placid on Friday. The loon was rescued by staff at the Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation and released onto Lake Champlain. (Provided photo — Nina Schoch)

ACLC volunteer field staff Ellie George named the juvenile “Spunky Snow-Wing” for its wing-rowing trek and its feisty behavior.

It also bit ACLC Biologist Griffin Archambault on the forearm as he released it into the water.

“That bird had a lot of spunk!” Schoch said.

Archambault said they are not sure where the loon came from. There’s not much open water left at this point in the winter. He guessed it either was living on a river with flowing water or came from far away. He said Spunky is an adolescent, based on the gray edges to its feathers and the youthful sound of its vocalizations.

Schoch brought Spunky back to the ACLC headquarters in Saranac Lake to measure and put identifying bands on its legs.

Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation’s new Executive Director Dorothy Waldt holds a loon rescued from a road in Lake Placid on Friday in a parking lot in Saranac Lake as ACLC Biologist Griffin Archambault measures the bird’s legs. (Enterprise photo — Aaron Marbone)

Banding rescued loons provides them with information about the birds’ migratory patterns, lifespan and survival.

“Many of the loons we band have been re-sighted in their wintering areas along the East Coast (some birds multiple times over multiple years), as well as in their breeding territories in subsequent summers,” Schoch wrote in an email. “It’s so exciting to know that a bird we rescued from such problems as being iced-in, grounded or from fishing line entanglement, has since survived for years and successfully raised chicks.”

ACLC staff did the work in the low temperatures next to Schoch’s van in a municipal parking lot behind ADK ArtRise — the old Sears lot.

This was the organization’s brand-new Executive Director Dorothy Waldt’s first time holding a loon. She asked questions on how to do it right and whispered “you’re OK” to the squirming adolescent loon while holding it gingerly but firmly. The bird was flopping its legs and wings, trying to free them from Waldt’s grasp and vocalizing softly as Archambault took measurements, blood and feather samples and banded the bird.

Schoch was having a bit of fun. After they placed the loon in Waldt’s hands she said “OK, bye, we’ll see you later” and feigned walking away. At one point, when the loon stopped wiggling, Schoch mentioned that it was behaving and added, “Either that, or you killed it, Dorothy,” Schoch said.

A loon named “Spunky Snow-Wing” takes off onto the waters of Lake Champlain on Friday after being found grounded on a road in Lake Placid and rescued by staff at the Adirondack Center for Loon Conservation earlier that day. (Provided photo — Ellie George)

“It’s breathing, Nina,” Waldt responded dryly.

The two already have a rapport as Schoch hands the executive director position off to Waldt.

Wald said the loon was warm as she held it.

“It’s nice to feel it breathing,” she said.

After she handed the bird back to Archambault she said she was thrilled to have handled a wild loon.

“That was very cool. Wow,” she said.

It was a day of firsts. After Archambault held the loon for a bit, intern Marissa McLean from SUNY Cortland got to hold the bird on her first rescue with the ACLC.

The organization has rescued four other iced-in juveniles over the last few weeks.

“Sometimes, juvenile loons haven’t figured out they need to migrate, and end up staying too long in the Adirondacks,” Schoch said in an email. “Then the winter weather sets in, and they get iced-in or blown down in a storm before they can fly to the coast.”

This puts them in danger of attacks from eagles.

In the third week of December, ACLC staff and rescue volunteers responded to help two juvenile loons iced in on Fourth Lake. They captured one and the other was able to fly out on its own after the temperature warmed. To read more about this rescue go to tinyurl.com/34pmexc5.

Right before Christmas, several loons were reported iced in on Brandt Lake and Paradox Lake. Some were captured. Others freed themselves. One disappeared and is assumed to have freed itself, because there were no signs it had been attacked by an eagle. To read more about these rescues go to tinyurl.com/bdeupt97 and tinyurl.com/kdahejaz.