A parliament of owls working out an eleventh-hour deal to keep the forest
from shutting down...?
Or maybe a failed attempt by the stakeholders in an owl love triangle to
resolve, at long last, the age-old question of who cooks for whom?
The female owl could just be going through some Jane Austen stuff right
now; a first-year bird who's still on the fence about whom to pair up with.
Jason Frank
Ortonville
On Thu, Mar 7, 2024 at 7:43 AM Kyle Te Poel wrote:
> This morning I saw two Barred Owls on the ground. From a distance of a few
> hundred feet, even with binoculars, I couldn't make out great detail about
> what was going on, but I presumed it was a territorial dispute and that
> perhaps one of the owls was being attacked. Or, perhaps one owl caught some
> prey and the other wanted it. But the seemingly aggressive behavior was not
> continuous; it would start and stop. Over the course of about 15-20
> minutes, this went on--lots of owls on backs, flapping wings, interspersed
> with moments where they'd stop, sometimes face each other, sometimes hunker
> down and get hard to spot, then sit up a bit taller, then physically
> interact again. Most of the time, one or both of the owls were vocal as
> well (usually the very high pitched wail). At some point, a third one flew
> in (but did not land near the other two), but I did not see if it landed
> nearby or continued on. Neither of the two owls on the ground paid it any
> obvious attention.
>
> I perused my bird behavior books, and many owl-based websites, and didn't
> find anything specifically describing what I saw (in fact, and much to my
> surprise, even my Stokes Guide to Bird Behavior repeatedly states "not much
> is known" about various Barred Owl activity).
>
> Eventually, both of the owls that were engaged with each other on the
> ground flew away, in the same direction, and moments later one was heard
> giving its typical who-cooks...call. Not sure what happened with the third
> owl that had flown in.
>
> As to what exactly was going on, I'm left not fully certain and would
> gladly hear any input from anyone who's witnessed anything similar. I
> assume the birds were not likely to be mating on the ground. I also assume
> that a fight would not result in both birds flying off together (or what
> appeared to be "together"), or taking "timeouts" during the act wherein
> both birds were just apparently relaxed and disengaged before eventually
> continuing with the tussle.
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Kyle Te Poel
> Stillwater Township, MN
>
>
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