SNN (ScrollingNetworkNews) ✿ ✿ Our Mel and Sydney returned to their nesting box with plenty of bonding occurring..but after 2.5 months of Sydney in the box from Dec 2013 to mid Feb 2014, the lack of prey gifts from Mel ( perhaps due to the severe and historic drought underway in California)and they have forgone the nesting process this year as many other raptors ✿ Compared to other owls of similar size, the Barn Owl has a much higher metabolic rate, requiring relatively more food. Pound for pound, Barn Owls consume more rodents – often regarded as pests by humans – than possibly any other creature. ✿ We remind viewers that sometimes owlets may not survive - the parents will dispose of things in "The Owl Way" -viewer discretion is advised, this is nature and the "Owl way". ✿ ~ ✿ “Animals, like us, are living souls. They are not things. They are not objects. Neither are they human. Yet they mourn. They love. They dance. They suffer. They know the peaks and chasms of being.” ― Gary Kowalski, The Souls of Animals ✿ Each species is a masterpiece, a creation assembled with extreme care and genius." ~ E.O. Wilson

Saturday, December 10, 2011

International Owl Award

Lady Gray'l Award - Barnaby the Barn Owl, England
2011
Barnaby flew into the lives of more than 1.8 million people between 1990 and 2010 flying in the Eagles of Paradise Free Flight Bird Show at Paradise Park in Cornwall, England.

Besides helping to illustrate the silent flight of Barn Owls and their amazing hearing, Barnaby also encouraged people to get involved to help his species in the wild, primarily through the Barn Owl Conservation Network.  He also helped train animal care students based at Duchy College in the art of positive reinforcement training and handling and care of raptors.

Together with his fellow members of the Paradise Park free flying bird team, Barnaby helped raise awareness of local and global conservation issues.  As a consequence, visitors donated more than £140,000 for bird conservation efforts.

Barnaby died on 21st of June, 2010 and is buried under the Tree of Heaven at the edge of the picnic lawn where he flew free for over 20 years.

Congratulations go out to this years winner of 2012 to PPO and Tracey
The Pot Plant Owl story has reached thousands of people around the globe, instilling in them an awareness, not only about owls, but about garden birds and Nature in general.

International Owl Award-The Lady Gray'l Award is named after a Great Gray Owl who was hatched in 1984. Thanks to caring biologists with an interesting plan, that same owl who would have starved as the runt of the brood. Lady Gray'l spent a 21-year career touching the lives of untold thousands of people and giving researchers new insights into the life of the Great Gray Owl. Lady Gray'l spent nearly her entire lifetime living and working with Dr. Bob Nero, raising money for owl research through their hundreds of school visits and day-long stints in malls. Thanks to Gray'l, Great Gray Owls were plucked from relative obscurity to become the provincial bird of Manitoba. Lady Gray'l flew from this world on October 13, 2005, and this award was established to honor her accomplishments by recognizing other owls following in her footsteps.