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

Thursday, March 22, 2012

BarredOwl - Leesville

These are Barred Owls, located in central North Carolina, in what is now a suburb. There were some 800 acres of old growth forest, now cleared for subdivisions. So the wild life has been sqeezed into the older neighborhoods where trees are 70-80 years old. These owls have nested in this box, some 200 feet behind my house, for the past 6 years. It is a heavily wooded area with a clear understory, that owls prefer to hunt in.
Leesville Owls is a nest box camera in the Leesville Township in central North Carolina.

The Barred Owl (Strix varia) is a large typical owl native to North America. It goes by many other names, including Eight Hooter, Rain Owl, Wood Owl, and Striped Owl, but is probably best known as the Hoot Owl based on its call. The most common mnemonic device for remembering the call is "Who cooks for you, who cooks for you all."
The Barred Owl has been known to live up to 10 years in the wild and 23 years in captivity.

Eggs should began hatching around 23 March.
1st egg laid Feb. 21, 2nd Feb. 23, 3rd Feb. 28, 2012
http://www.ustream.tv/channel/leesville-owls