By Yvonne Wallace Blane | Co-founder and Director, Fellow Mortals
With December come preparations for those who celebrate Christmas and observe other winter traditions--and for great horned owls, the cold and clear nights are filled with social events and meet and greets as well--important occasions for this 'tiger of the night,' for this is the time that mated pairs again roost together and new partners are chosen by young birds breeding for the first time, or by those adults who have lost a mate.
Great horned owls are monogamous and often mate for life. They are the first birds to nest every season and do not build their own nest, but utilize a structure built by another species--sometimes a squirrel, sometimes another bird--or a natural cavity. The average nest is two to three eggs, laid at the end of January and incubated to hatch at the end of February.
Once the first egg is laid, the female will leave the nest infrequently to stretch her wings or do 'house keeping,' perhaps tidying a branch or moving a piece of uneaten food. The male, however, is more active than ever, as he is now hunting for two. Once all the eggs hatch, the male is responsible for providing for the entire family for the first month, until the nestlings are able to maintain their own body temperature without being incubated by the female. The parents will still be close by, and if the young are threatened the large adults will appear suddently on silent, powerful wings.
When the young owls have fledged (left the nest), at about 4 weeks of age, they will perch on branches around the nest site while the adult owls hunt for the family. Nature has perfectly timed the birth of the first prey animals to coincide with the needs of the voracious young owls, who grow rapidly in the first weeks of life and will be as large as their parents by six to eight weeks of age--long before they are capable of surviving on their own.
The young of predatory birds stay with their parents much longer than those of young of other species and great horned owls are no exception. The young birds must not only be capable of flight but must learn from experience and their parents to become proficient hunters before they leave their parents to find their own territory and a mate before embarking on what can be a very long life in the wild.
Great horned owls can be found across North America, and similar species occur world wide. Not only are these birds magnificent creatures, but they are the top of the pyramid in their niche in nature, and are crucial to maintaining balance in prey populations.
It is a rare privilege to hear the hooting of a great horned owl pair--or a number of individuals on a 'meet and greet' seeking to find a mate or establish a territory, so if you are fortunate to hear their hooting some December evening, remember that while we humans go about the preparations so important to our species, the wild ones have their own rituals and celebrations as well.
Thank you for the support that makes it possible for us to continue to provide help for the great horned owls that come to us injured or orphaned--and for allowing us to educate to inspire respect for all wild ones with whom we share the earth.
Links:
By Fellow Mortals Wildlife Hospital | Project Leader
By Yvonne Wallace Blane | Project Leader
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