From the ARC

There's been a lot going on in bird-land recently - Gully, the female Great Horned Owl, is sitting on eggs, and keeping us guessing on whether or not they're fertile. They think Gordon (Mr. Male) was taken out early enough so that they're just dummy eggs, but no way to tell for sure just yet.

It's funny - someone said the other day that birds of prey attract other birds of prey, and I'm starting to believe it. It might just be the location, but every Saturday the birds are out, the wild birds come for a visit! There's been a family of red-tails, a curious coopers, and even a daring little boy Kestrel who tried to challenge Cora in flight.

or maybe, once you start looking, you just notice that they're everywhere! We went canoeing on the Econ river for New Years, and I swear, we saw more fluffed up red tailed hawks on that river than I'd ever seen before. Between them, and the flocks of American Robins migrating through, I was wishing we had thought to bring the telephoto out.

(Two canoe tippings later, I was glad we left it at home.)

Hunter was surprisingly talkative today - usually he just sits there and winks at all his visitors, but I caught him mid-trill.



Hunter gets a lot of visitors who thinks he's stuffed, or a toy bird, so much so that they've even had a sign put up, in hopes that people will stop trying to poke at him. He really is a sweetie though.



This European Barn Owl, Henry, has been my buddy lately. He's patient with the glove training, and light enough that my arm doesn't want to fall off after a day toting him around.



He's a real looker too. People are really drawn to Henry because of his coloring - the soft white feathers are why they used to call them Ghost Owls, and sadly, why misinformed farmers used to chase them off their land. To think of all the mice they could have been rid of.



Our female Kestrel, Callie, has been giving me less issues. She's at the center because she and her sisters were taken from their nest by a family looking for pets, and had imprinted on humans. Imprinting makes all birds unsuitable for the wild - they lack vital instincts, and other birds can sense, and will fight against, their oddness. It effects their personalities differently - where imprinting has made Mr. P, a Barred Owl, calm and sweet, it has made Callie a brat.

She's learned that we won't hurt her, so she thinks nothing of diving at stray fingers, or swiping at clothes. I appealed to her stomach today with some fresh picked grasshoppers.



While her attitude was cool today, her behavior was silly. When I went to give her some grasshoppers later in the day, she started manteling - spreading her wings to hide her food from other birds of prey. But she didn't have any food to hide! Eventually she jumped out and started beheading grasshoppers again, with wild abandon.