I have a family of baby screech owls in my backyard, and they're adorably fluffy and endlessly fascinating
ALLOUEZ - My gardens are giving untamed jungle vibes this year, and while unrelenting rain has something to do with it, so does the fact that I find myself always looking up when I should be looking down.
Who has time for bending over to pull weeds and a trillion sprouting helicopter seeds in waterlogged mulch when you can be watching your new neighbors? They’re a family of Eastern screech owls — mom, dad and four wide-eyed, poofy, floofy kids — and adorable doesn’t begin to describe them.
As it so often works in neighborhoods, it was the longtime residents who first tipped me off to the new arrivals. That would be the crows, who who are basically the local Harriet Oleson when it comes to letting everyone within earshot know when something, usually not to their liking, is going on. If they hadn’t been making such a ruckus from high atop the silver maple in my backyard early one evening, I might never have spotted what looked like one of those Furby toys everybody went bananas for in the ’90s holding on for dear life on a rather flimsy branch.
There was just one. No sign of anybody else. I was beyond excited.
When you have mature trees, gardens, all kinds of water sources, feeders and houses and you don’t use pesticides, birds tend to find you. In addition to all the year-round regulars, I sometimes garden in the presence of visiting mallard ducks and wild turkeys. During spring migration this year, there were thrilling drop-ins by indigo buntings, Baltimore orioles, rose-breasted grosbeaks, a common yellowthroat and a scarlet tanager.
But an owlet? That's special.
So imagine my surprise the next day when there were two fuzzy balls of gray feathers and big eyes parked nearby in a much smaller elm tree with their parents, a petite couple with rusty-colored markings and an excellent camouflage game. By that night, I spotted three owlets. The next day, four!
And no, I had not been drinking.
It’s quite common for screech owls to be in urban areas and neighborhoods, said Lori Bankson, curator of animals at Bay Beach Wildlife Sanctuary in Green Bay, but seeing them is another story.
“What’s uncommon is for them to be out around people. They’re really reclusive, so it’s pretty exciting when you can find a good sighting and a good nest like that. It’s a lot of fun,” she said. “Screech owls adapt really well to being with people with nesting in nest boxes or tree cavities, but what they’re always afraid of is predation, especially urban screech owls.”
It's not easy being an owl the Cornell Lab of Ornithology describes as "no bigger than a pint glass." Opossums, raccoons and larger owls, like the great horned owls I hear in the fall, are among its predators. Cooper’s hawks will sometimes grab the babies, blue jays will take infants, and chipmunks can raid the eggs, Bankson said.
“They’re really, really cautious about where they have their nest,” she said. “It’s common but it’s not commonly seen.”
Screech owls only have one clutch a year; the parents are very protective
Maybe their nest was in my hulking maple or in any number of others in the neighborhood. I only know that those four fledglings have been fascinating. We’ve stared at one another for hours, or at least I have. Sometimes when they are all lined up together on a branch in a way that makes you want to sit down right then and there and write a children’s book about them, their eyes are closed and they’re snoozing.
I’ve had the binoculars out, and the bird books, too. I’ve attempted way too many photos, one more grainy than the other. Perhaps it's a reminder that nature is best appreciated in the moment.
Mostly though, they just go about their business and I go about mine. They seem far less interested in me than I am in them. The whole family is always in close proximity and sometimes doesn't move for hours. When they do, even when you know which tree they're in, they can be incredibly hard to spot.
The fledglings are never not under the close supervision of their parents, who have given me the kind of piercing death stare that seems to be saying, “Be as giddy and googly-eyed as you want down there, lady, but DO NOT DISTURB.”
Pretty sure that goes double for the two garden cats, one built like a sandbag and the other like a french fry. Neither cat nor bird has to worry, since screech owls do the majority of their hunting in the first hours after the sun sets ... when the cats are back to living the good life indoors.
“They’re really protective,” Bankson said of adult screech owls, who have just one clutch a year. “They’re one of the few owls that both parents will take care of the nest. It is neat to see that whole family together, and they work hard to make sure those little ones are protected.”
Screech owls in urban settings tend to fledge quicker than those in quieter, rural settings, she said. The babies start flying at four to six weeks and will stay with their parents for a couple of months, through the summer at least, as they get stronger at flying and hunting, Bankson said. Once they get their adult plumage, they’ll take on the same rust coloring of their parents, but there are also gray screech owls.
Their preferred food is mice, which makes them a welcome addition to the neighborhood They also eat insects and small birds.
To add to the cuteness factor, I often hear them as it gets near dusk making the softest of calls. It has been described as a purr, whinny or trill. If you weren’t listening for it, you might miss it.
“When that itty-bitty whirr comes out, it’s just adorable for their size,” Bankson said. “It just works.”
I see my owl friends significantly less now in the second week, as they expand their territory and broaden their horizons, but what an honor to get to know them. Stay safe out there, everybody.
Now, back to the weeding.
Kendra Meinert is an entertainment and feature writer at the Green Bay Press-Gazette. Contact her at 920-431-8347 or [email protected]. Follow her on X @KendraMeinert.
This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: A family of baby screech owls in my backyard has been such a hoot
