I have to concur with Tim on this one.
The question lately has become, where can you avoid running into Barred
Owls? Or -- if you're a runner who fancies the idea of going out for a
run in one of the local parks before dawn or after dusk, where can you
go to avoid being scalped by one of these aggressive invaders?
In the past six months, I've found three road-killed Barred Owls along
the 1-mile stretch of Hwy 99W that I patrol most regularly. That's just
slightly higher than my road-killed American Robin count for the same
period, though slightly lower than my road-killed Virginia Opossum
count.
Barred Owls are here, they are widespread, and as Tim noted they are a
threat to our endemic species, the Northern Spotted Owl. I've only seen
or heard Spotted Owls a few times in my life.
Last June I heard one call a couple of times in the night, on the edge
of one of western Oregon's oldest old-growth forest tracts. This was one
from a pair that I knew was there, and which is also well-known to BLM
surveyors. There is still a pair present, but they haven't nested in at
least two years due to pressure from Barred Owls.
Just before dawn on that same night last June, I heard a Barred Owl pair
calling back and forth, from within a few yards and probably one of them
from the very same tree that the Spotted Owl had called from, earlier in
the night.
Good birding,
Joel
--
Joel Geier
Camp Adair north of Corvallis
OBOL archives: www.freelists.org/archive/obol
Manage your account or unsubscribe: //www.freelists.org/list/obol
Contact moderators: obol-moderators@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
