By GLENN GARNETT
The call of the Great Horned Owl is a common one in cottage country and if you’re lucky, you may spot one of these magnificent birds in flight or in a tree glaring down at you with those huge yellow eyes.
Kevin Bissessar of the Mountsberg Wildlife Centre near Milton, Ont. recently introduced me to his pal Oscar the Great Horned Owl. The sleepy-looking bird sat peacefully on his perch at the Cottage Life show and listened patiently as Bissessar told me his life story.
Make that her life story.
Seems thirty years ago when Oscar was a mere owlet she was found by some kids along a road in Halton. “Car injuries are quite common for birds, including owls,” Bissessar says. “Two boys found it and thought it would make a cool pet. Well, owls aren’t cool pets - they take a lot of work. With those talons you really have to handle with care and you can’t toilet train them.”
Eventually the boys’ parents brought the little Great Horned Owl to the wildlife centre.
“It looked like a little ball of fluff, sort of like Oscar the Grouch on Sesame Street,” Bissessar explains. Maybe this Oscar was so grouchy because they misidentified her sex - but it wasn’t the fault of the Mountsberg staff.
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“With owls, you have a 50-50 chance of guessing right,” Bissessar says with a shrug. “Eventually you can tell by their size - fully grown, a female is about a third larger than a typical male.”
The largest owl species in North America, mature Great Horned Owls vary in size from 18-25” in length with wingspans up to an impressive five feet. They can weigh up to two pounds after a good feed.
Bissessar says Great Horned Owls are, for the most part, nocturnal animals, which Oscar could attest to being barely able to keep her eyes open that afternoon. Their keen sense of sight explains their reputation as ruthless hunters in the night.
The owls were first spotted in Virginia in the eighteenth century and also fly under the names hoot owls, cat owls or, possibly their favourite sobriquet, winged tigers. They get their name from their horn-like “ear tufts” that don’t have anything to do with hearing. They come in reddish brown, grey or black and white and possess big yellow-orange eyes under those hooded eyelids.
You can find Great Horned Owls pretty much anywhere in the Western Hemisphere from the treeline down to south America - most of them, save the ones in northern climes, stay put year-round.
Oscar has become more than a guest at the wildlife centre - she’s been perched there since 1972 and may still be there for another decade or more. That’s because owls can live far longer in a protected environment, Bissessar points out.
You’ll be glad to hear this isn’t another mournful plea for understanding and protection - the Great Horned Owl isn’t in any particular danger of extinction.
The barred owl, a cousin to the Great Horned Owl, is beginning to disappear from southern Ontario as its habitat is vanishing thanks to development. The Great Horned Owl, in contrast, appears to be remarkably adaptable.
Oscar might appeal to you as cute, but there’s nothing sweet about his species’ hunting style. Those large snatching talons can kill prey like rats and squirrels instantly, and a motivated owl will swoop down and carry off prey two to three times its own weight. They’ll bound across the ground (and have been known to pop into a chicken coop or two) or even wade into a river or stream to pick up dinner and can swallow their meal whole.
“They’ve been known to eat a cat - small pets can disappear if they’re in the neighbourhood,” Bissessar offers helpfully.
According to The Owl Pages (www.owlpages.com), their menu includes at least 253 delicacies including skunks, minks, armadillos, porcupines, bats, ducks and even young alligators.
The Great Horned Owl is also a veritable one-bird band with large repertoire of sounds, ranging from deep booming hoots to shrill shrieks.
“Both sexes hoot, but males have a lower-pitched voice than females,” The Owl Pages reports.
“They give a growling "krrooo-oo" or screaming note when attacking intruders. Other sounds include a "whaaa whaaaaaa-a-a-aarrk" from disturbed birds, a catlike "MEEE-OWww", barks, hair-raising shrieks, coos, and beak snapping.”
Like Oscar the Grouch, owls seem to be happiest alone - that is, unless you count the occasions they get together to make little owls. “They’re quite territorial,” Bissessar says, “ and will chase away owls and other birds that encroach on their area. Even hawks are quite afraid of them.”
Man, naturally, is the only other species Great Horned Owls have to worry about. Besides head-on collisions with cars, they often meet their end in traps, powerlines and from gun shots.
Breeding is the first order of business for owls after New Year’s and during the first couple of years, males and females start hooting at each other. According to The Owl Pages, they bow to each other with drooped wings when close to one another. One thing they don’t do is built a little place of their own - they’ll muscle into nests built by other birds like hawks or herons or even use squirrels’ warrens or an abandoned building in a pinch. Once they’ve nested, look out - they’ll attack anything approaching the nest “until the intruder is killed or driven off,” The Owl Pages say.
Owls will lay between one to five eggs. Once the kids show up, the family sticks together for just a short time ‘til the owlets take to the air in the fall. Being solitary birds, Mom and Dad go their separate ways. Meanwhile, about half of their offspring will not survive their first year.
Great Horned Owls don’t tend to wander too far afield - their hunting ranges tend to be within six square miles.
As for Oscar, she seems content on her perch, posing patiently for interested adults and kids who come visit her at Mountsberg. Sure, she’s a little high maintenance - but well worth the effort.
