Barred Owls In Love
I’m standing in the soupy slush pit formerly known as my lawn, peering up into a canopy of sugar maples. It’s evening, so I can’t see much. I know that owls are up there, though. From their calls, I know they’re barred owls. Barred owls with lust in their hearts. Barred owls keen to meet someone who shares their values, settle down and make little barred owls.
“You owls,” I tell them, “need to get a room.”
Owl romance has been a preoccupation of mine recently. I blame my husband. Ever since sugaring season began, he has shunned my company in favor of sitting around an evaporator pan with his stinky friends, watching sap boil. Unlike owls, men in sugarhouses make no effort to appeal to females. They grow scratchy beards, indulge in dubious personal hygiene and if they talk at all, say things like, “Ooo, look. The sap just went up one degree,” and “I’m serious. Mike filters syrup with his pants.”
No wonder I prefer to focus on another species. Besides, it’s impossible not to think about the love lives of owls when the house is nightly under siege from a flock of hormonal hooting Hedwigs.
Since I’m stuck thinking about owl romance, I might as well do so in an informed way. To learn more about barred owls, I contacted the Vermont Institute of Natural Science (VINS), headquartered in Quechee, and arranged to meet with Allison Stark, Director of Wildlife Services.
From Allison, I learned that barred owls are relatively common to the northern woodlands. They’re fluffy, speckle feathered birds with black eyes, capable of a variety of different vocalizations. In addition to their familiar “who-cooks-for-you” call, barred owls scream, hiss and “laugh.” I’ve heard this laugh out in the woods, hiking by myself. It’s freaky. I can best describe it as a shared comic moment between a howler monkey and a criminally deranged, husky-voiced chicken.
In spring, barred owls give plaintive, two syllable courtship calls. These are the sounds I’ve been hearing recently. Allison said that the frequency of the courting owls’ visits to my home suggests that I’m blessed with a bounty of vermin. This makes sense to me. Chez Tillinghast is indeed rodent rich real estate. Mice, red squirrels and voles live in abundance around, and all too frequently in, the house, their diets supplemented by a tasty mix of garden bulbs and dog food.
But why such a noticeable increase in barred owls this year? According to Allison, this winter has witnessed a migration of raptors down from Canada due to a prey population crash. VINS has been taking in starving owls and rehabilitating them.
However, do-it-yourself rescuers be warned: people who feed owls and other raptors risk starring in their own Alfred Hitchcock movie, because by feeding them, they’re teaching the birds to look at humans and think, “meat snack!” Dive bombing and other hijinks involving sharp beaks and talons may ensue. So, unless you like to wear a helmet and body armor every time you walk to the mailbox, don’t feed the birds. If you find a raptor in distress, call VINS or a certified wildlife rehabilitator.
As for why I’ve been hearing the owls so often, Allison explained that the species’ courtship season begins in February and continues until mid-to-late March. One of VINS’ tasks this time of year is “re-nesting” owlets, either by putting them in owl boxes at sites where their original nests were destroyed or, when family reunion isn’t possible, fostering the owlets. Surprisingly, VINS’ resident owls help with this effort, interacting with and sometimes even feeding the young ones.
After answering my questions, Allison introduced me to VINS’ resident owls and other “educational birds” that, due to injuries, can’t be returned to the wild. Allison affectionately described VINS’ owls as “perch potatoes;” their favorite activity seems to be sitting perfectly still on their perches, practicing owlish inscrutability. In contrast, VINS’ oldest avian resident, a female turkey vulture, is more of an extrovert. She’s a “real sweetie” whose hobbies include fussing with a rope-and-wood-block toy, hopping on the arms of handlers and playfully picking apart carcasses. O.K., maybe her Internet dating profile needs work, but I found the bird oddly endearing, in an ugly-cute kind of way.
As a nonprofit organization, VINS relies on public donations and volunteers. There are many fun opportunities for individuals and families to get involved. VINS will soon be starting up its baby bird feeding program again, with the addition this year of a viewing window to enable the public to observe all the action. Details about spring break camp experiences for kids, upcoming avian rehabilitation workshops and other programs are available at VINS’ website, http://www.vinsweb.org. Or call 802-359-5000.
The VINS trip inspired me. I wanted to do something to help out my owls, so I built them a bird house, using a barred owl friendly design that I researched on the Internet. The house hangs thirty feet up on a tree in the nearby woods. There’s no sign of habitation so far, but I’m hopeful that soon, some lucky owl couple will discover it, deem it acceptable and at long last, get a room.