Barn Owl owlets hiss and sway

 

A nest box with four baby American Barn Owls (Tyto furcata). Buster Banish and I led a fabulous group of people around Mohican State Forest and nearby spots last Saturday, June 7, as part of Time & Optics' Optics Fling event. The group - 18 Amish folks, many of them teens - didn't really need our help, other than the driving It was one of the most expert groups I've helped "lead" a trip for, and they probably first found most of the birds. When Buster or I found something, it took no time at all to get everyone on it, and some of the young men had an incredible knowledge of songs, and call notes. What a treat to bird with them.

We also saw a whopper Spiny Softshell Turtle, a Gray Petaltail dragonfly (always notable and a specialist of wooded seepages), saw many interesting plants, got to watch a male Yellow-breasted Chat performing his aerial display flight at close range, and much more. In all, we tallied 90 bird species during this six-hour foray.

Our last hurrah was a visit to an Amish farm that has produced many Barn Owls over the years. I got to peek into the box and get hissed at. There are certainly more Barn Owls nesting in the Holmes County region than anywhere else in Ohio, due to at least two primary reasons: One, the farms are not saturated with chemicals, and there is plenty of fencerows, scruffy edge habitat, and meadows, and 2) the Amish have placed dozens of owl boxes in barns. The video follows and be sure to turn your volume up.

©Jim McCormac

NOTE about Barn Owl taxonomy: Some of you may have noticed I used the name American Barn Owl, and Tyto furcata, to refer to this species. It was long known as Barn Owl (Tyto alba). The Barn Owl is the most widely distributed owl, occurring on every continent but Antarctica, including remote islands such as the Galapagos.

The Barn Owl, until recently, had been divvied into 28 or 32 subspecies, depending on the authority, based on notable morphological differences between populations. DNA sequencing and molecular studies have recently led to the Barn Owl being cleaved into three species. Tyto alba, the Barn Owl of North America, becomes the American Barn Owl (Tyto furcata) (the subject of this post). Our former Tyto alba is now applied to the birds of Europe and Africa, which is now known as the Western Barn Owl. The third species split from the Tyto alba complex is the Eastern Barn Owl (Tyto javanica), which occurs in the East Indies, Australia, and elsewhere in the Western Pacific.

Nature: Ornithologist seeks input for his Central Ohio Owl Project

A barn owl dozes on a barn's hay rail in southern Ohio/Jim McCormac

Nature: Ornithologist seeks input for his Central Ohio Owl Project

Columbus Dispatch
February 7, 2021

NATURE
Jim McCormac

In the bird world, owls rank high among our imperfectly understood avifauna. Most species are strictly nocturnal, and they are adept in the art of camouflage. Sometimes one lucks into a roosting owl, but the vast majority remain undetected. They tend to be heard more than seen.

The most common breeding owl in Ohio is the eastern screech owl. Most people reading this live in close proximity to this secretive species but probably don’t know it. Participants in the 1981 Toledo Christmas Bird Count made a special effort to ferret out this species. They found a remarkable 112 birds within the count’s 15-mile circle, illuminating the true abundance of this mysterious species.

Gaining a better understanding of Ohio’s owls is a goal of Ohio Dominican University ornithologist Blake Mathys. Last fall, he launched the Central Ohio Owl Project. His research actually extends beyond the title, as Mathys will accept owl reports from anywhere in the state.

As the university and Blake are here in Central Ohio, that’s where the majority of owl reports are received. The project is off to a flying start, with about 1,300 records collected so far.

The “Big Three” resident Ohio owls are barred owl, the aforementioned screech owl and the great horned owl. This trio represents by far the majority of the state’s owls, and they occur in every county, often commonly. Mathys wants reports of these species, but is prioritizing research on a much scarcer parliament of owls: the barn, long-eared and northern saw-whet owls.

Well-named barn owls are prone to roosting in their namesake structures, silos or old abandoned buildings. I’m sure more than a few farmers come across barn owls, and Mathys would love to hear about them.

The northern saw-whet owl and long-eared owl are primarily migrants and winter visitors in Ohio. These two are strictly nocturnal and typically roost in dense evergreens, grape tangles or thick brush during the day. Habitual roost sites are sometime given away by streaks of “whitewash” below. I remember a saw-whet owl that wintered near Columbus years ago. It roosted in a dense cedar over some bee hives. The owner noticed an increasing amount of bird poop staining his hives, and looked up into the tree to see an owl staring back.

Long-eared owls take camouflage to remarkable levels. At rest, they resemble plump little great horned owls, their ear tufts sometimes flopped down like a basset hound. When perceived threats are nearby, the owl will stand stiff, pull its feathers in and erect its ear tufts. The resemblance to a broken-off branch is uncanny.

In recent weeks, Mathys has verified two reports of long-eared owls roosting in ornamental spruce trees within close proximity of houses. This owl can be colonial, and roosts of up to 20 birds have been found in Ohio.

The Central Ohio Owl Project is slated to continue for the next several years. Mathys’ end game is to develop a clearer picture of the status and distribution of owls, and he is also gathering data on diet. Owls vomit indigestible fur and bone of victims in the form of compact pellets, which can often be found under roosts. Dissecting and analyzing pellet contents reveals prey choices.

Let’s deluge Mathys with owl reports. He would be most appreciative. The more we learn about our owls, the better we can conserve these charismatic animals. All reports will be kept strictly confidential.

For more information on the Central Ohio Owl Project, including how to report owls, visit: https://www.ohiodominican.edu/owlproject. Or email Blake Mathys at: mathysb@ohiodominican.edu

Naturalist Jim McCormac writes a column for The Dispatch on the first, third and fifth Sundays of the month. He also writes about nature at www.jimmccormac.blogspot.com

 

Owl pellet, dissected

A short while back, on my birthday as fate would have it, I wrote about this drowsy female Barn Owl. She had taken up an intermittent roost site in a Knox County barn. You can see that post HERE.

While the owl may be drowsy in this photo, she becomes a winged tiger come nightfall, and we've got the pellets to prove it. Read on...

These are Barn Owl pellets. The pellets in this photo are not from the bird in the previous photo; I made this image some years back courtesy of a bird in Jackson County. No matter, the protagonist of this post created pellets just as robust as these. If you scan the aforementioned post you'll some pictures of her handiwork.

The production of an owl pellet is a very necessary bodily function for the owl, but if we humans were to do the same act we would be considered crass indeed. Downright Neanderthal, in fact. Basically, an owl pellet is a giant furball, upchucked via the mouth in the manner of a cat. Much bobbing and wretching can accompany the expulsion of a pellet, but I'm sure the owl feels 10x better afterwards. The contents of a pellet are the indigestible parts of its victims: bone and fur.

Photo: Carma Jo Kauffman

You can only imagine my delight when Carma Jo Kauffman sent along this photo. Had it only been my birthday. In all seriousness, I find this photo utterly cool, and am glad that Carma Jo - sometimes tender of the owl - allowed me to share it with you. On my visit, I snatched a few pellets from the barn floor and did a quick and dirty dissection so that she could see the contents, along with a brief lecture on why owl pellets are made.

Carma Jo took owl pellet dissection many steps further, and she and I believe one of her daughters painstaking extracted and sorted the contents of this pellet. Yes, pellet - everything that you see in this photo was removed from just ONE owl pellet. She's even neatly numbered things - those are seven (7), count 'em, skulls! Various and sundry other underpinnings that create the superstructure of a mouse or vole are scattered about. No wonder these owls gag and heave to expel these pellets!

I am not an adept when it comes to identifying skulls and bones that were festering in owl pellets, but I know the parts in Carma Jo's pellet were from small rodents. The primary victim was probably the hapless beast hanging here, the Meadow Vole, Microtus pennsylvanicus. Do yourself a favor: never come back as a vole. Everyone wants to eat you, and the end will not be pretty. Very few voles, I suspect, die of old age. The animal in this photo was harvested by a Northern Shrike, which unceremoniously hung it in this autumn-olive bush. We saw almost the whole thing go down, and it was cool! The shrike, or butcherbird, came lumbering in toting the vole, disappeared into the shrubs, and as soon as the bird left we dashed in to inspect the kill. Later, the shrike, which is essentially a feathered Vlad the Impaler, would have returned and torn the cute little critter apart, gobbling down the chunks.

If a vole could choose its executioner, it would probably opt for the Barn Owl. The end would come quick, with an unseen and unheard WHACK and a fast bite to sever the base of the spinal cord. Hours later, our vole would come back - as a regurgitated compact mass of fur and bones.

This is a White-footed Mouse, Peromyscus leucopus, another of Nature's furry sausages with legs. They are also probably routine victims of Barn Owls. Rodents such as these are good at what they do, which is eat and reproduce. Thanks to voles, mice and their ilk, we have spectacular predators such as Barn Owls to ooh and ahh over.

Barn Owl!

Pastoral Knox County, Ohio. This is Barn Owl country, and some of the barns such as the one in this photo are haunted - haunted by monkey-faced owls. Whether or not this particular barn has an owl in residence I do not know, but it isn't far from a barn that does.

Barns Owls are certainly not common in Ohio, and are officially listed as threatened. I suspect there are many more than we know about, though. They are strictly nocturnal, and only likely to be found when roosting during the daytime, and the roost is likely to be in someone's private farm outbuilding, and such places are not frequented by birders.

Thus, I was delighted to get a recent email, telling me of an owl in residence in the aforementioned Knox County. The homeowners are nice as can be, and were willing to allow me to visit and have look at their owl.

So, on a recent Saturday, I piled Peter King and Bruce Miller in the car and headed up to meet the Barn Owl's landlords, and hopefully the owl as well. Upon entering the barn, it didn't take but a New York second to figure out where the bird's favorite haunt was - the floor underneath was dappled with enormous owl pellets and painted with a fair bit of whitewash.

We glanced up into the rafters, and there she was, tucked in and paying us absolutely no mind. And it is a "she": note the lovely tawny wash to the breast and the copious sprinkling of black dots. Males tend to be much whiter and considerably less speckled. This bird does appear to have an injury of some sort on its breast, but apparently it is healthy enough and eating like a horse. It's been using the barn for over a month, and the piles of pellets attest to its vole-catching prowess.

This is a working farm and a working barn, and apparently the owl has become thoroughly accustomed to activity. Twenty feet or so below the owl lurked Peter, Bruce, myself, and the lady of the house, although we spoke in muted whispers. At our feet gamboled several very active kittens, the progeny of a couple of adult barn cats. And there was Tig, a large and rather ferocious appearing "guard dog", who was nosing the kittens about and occasionally letting loose a bark. None of this hubbub caused the owl to as much as flinch, let alone open its eyes.

From my experience, there are basically two types of Barn Owl behavior regarding barn-roosting birds. Some, like this animal, are quite tame and not put off by people. They'll just remain perched high in the rafters or on the hay rail, and quiet observers - or even not so quiet ones - will not cause them apparent concern.

But there are plenty of spooky Barn Owls. These birds do not like intruders, and as soon as someone enters their dwelling they'll promptly catapult out the nearest exit hole and into the wide open outdoors. These are the birds to leave alone. A Barn Owl ensconced in the shadowy rafters of a barn is a safe owl. A Barn Owl flushed from its fortress during the day becomes far more vulnerable to those who would eat or otherwise relentlessly dog the bird. This is an almost strictly nocturnal owl, and forcing one to be exposed to hawks, crows, jays, the watchful eyes of Great Horned Owls and all manner of tormentors, some deadly, some just annoying, is not the thing to do.

Upon leaving the barn, I grabbed a couple of owl pellets. We retreated to another barn (owless) barn, and dissected one of them. Owl pellets are compact masses of indigestibles: fur, and bones. Several hours after swallowing a tasty mouse or vole, the owl commences to bob and gurgle like a frat boy that chugged too much beer, and out comes one of these surprisingly large pellets. The vole's skull is in the foreground, and various bones from the hapless victim can be seen projecting from its fur. An intact pellet is at the right.

The homeowner was very interested in these pellets and their composition, as any right-minded intellectually curious person ought to be. Just today, she texted me a photo of a pellet that she had much more painstakingly dismantled. It contained five (5!) vole and mice skulls! Apparently the owl is flourishing in its Knox County digs, and I hope there are many others in the area.

Barn Owl and cat hit it off, big time!

I'm on a bit of an owl jag, but one can never get enough of owls! A friend shared the following video with me, and it is amazing. It features a Barn Owl, Tyto alba, that was raised from a chick and trained for falconry, of all things. The owl is named Gebra, and her most unlikely buddy is a black housecat dubbed Fum. These animals live in Spain, and were born in early spring of 2010. They were introduced when only a month old, and as you'll see, hit it off rather grandly.

Sorry, for some reason YouTube won't allow me to embed this video, so just click on the following link to view it: http://youtu.be/mWhD5bc6Fmg

Barn Owl in willow

Photo: Dane Adams

While poking around the impoundment at Lorain Harbor on Lake Erie on August 2, Larry Richardson was surprised to find this Barn Owl hiding amongst the foliage of a large willow tree. Dane Adams stopped by later and took the interesting photo above.

Barn Owls are near their northern limits in Ohio, and are quite the rare breeder. There are perhaps 50 known breeding pairs in the state. Barn Owls, at least at northern latitudes, do migrate but most fall migrants occur much later in the season than this bird. The habitat in the general area of highly industrial Lorain Harbor doesn't seem conducive to breeding Barn Owls, but who knows. An old power plant - the one that used to discharge warm water into the harbor and keep it ice-free in winter - is just a short flight from where Larry found this bird. I've always seen brown (Norway) rats scamper across the asphalt in this area on a few occasions. Maybe owls have taken up residence in the decommissioned and unused power plant, and dine largely on rats.

Or maybe it's a post-breeding dispersal bird; an unseasonably early migrant that turned up in one of Lake Erie's migrant traps. Whatever the case, finding a Barn Owl in Ohio is always a treat and congrats to Larry for finding it, and to Dane for sharing the photo.

Some really odd-looking birds

Leucistic Turkey Vulture, Holmes County, Ohio area. Photo by Dane Adams.

Paul Hershberger recently sent along some interesting photos and observations from the Trail, Ohio area that he was gracious enough to allow me to share. All photos are by Dane Adams.

While out exploring last Saturday, Dane and Paul came across this striking specimen. Turkey Vultures are common enough, but individuals such as this certainly aren't. "Whitey" is a highly leucistic specimen, and must stick out like a sore thumb. Leucism is a genetic condition that causes dark pigments to be washed out, in a nutshell, causing excessively pale individuals. A true albino would have pink eyes, likely be stark white, but probably would not have made it out of the nest. Pure albino birds often suffer from greatly weakened feather shafts and other impediments caused by the albinism and don't survive to adulthood, at least species that attain this size.

It'll be interesting to see how long this bird lasts. Some years back, around 2000, there was a similar Turkey Vulture that spent its summers in Belmont County, and was widely seen and reported on for quite a few years.

Ghostly-looking Barn Owl. Paul reports that these owls are having a good nesting season in the Holmes County region, following a winter of high mortality due to deep snow cover. Barn Owls are at the northern cusp of their distribution in Ohio, and are vulnerable to prolonged nasty winter weather. Globally, this is the most broadly distributed of all owls, found on every continent but Antarctica. They pushed northward into Ohio following the opening up of our vast forests that blanketed Ohio prior to European settlement, which created favorable habitat for the birds.

A large family of owlets peer from a nest box. Barn Owls can respond rapidly to favorable opportunities, such as a boom in food sources. Meadow Voles - a small mouse-like rodent - must be doing well in the meadows up that way, leading to large broods such as this one. Normally, a clutch of six eggs would be on the large end of the brood size. Here's hoping that the "monkey-faced owls" flourish up there this year, and kudos to all of the farmers who provide nest sites for them, and even provide food during brutal winter weather.

Thanks to Paul and Dana for sharing these great birds.