Spring hootenanny

[sholio]

It's late and dark. Sitting with my laptop on the couch, I heard faintly what I supposed was distant owls, and went quietly outside onto the porch to listen. For a few minutes I was charmed by a call-and-response series of hoots, the very iconic "hoo-hoo ... hoo-HOO" pattern that I assume is great horned owls. After a few of these, I glimpsed a very large winged shape swoop across the slightly lighter city glow of the sky, flit across the sky above the yard and up to the darkness of the trees on top of the hills, where the hoot-and-answer resumed. (Now even louder, echoing faintly; it's such a deep, grand sound when they're close.)

I can now add "saw a great horned owl fly at night" to my list of life experiences. I've seen them sitting in the trees at twilight a few times, but never that.

Comments

[philomytha]

Oh, how lovely! Your very own Scary Owl! We never hear them here in the city, but there are always loads when we go canal boating but I've only seen one flying once, at dawn in the mist over the canal.

[sholio]

My very own Scary Owl! <3 That's so cool that you saw one flying at dawn in the mist; what an amazing sight that must have been.

[passingbuzzards]

Ahh, marvelous! And the call-and-response thing you heard may mean it's a mated pair, owl date... :-D I have a pair of great horned owls living in my area too, I periodically hear hooting right above my bedroom at night and saw them swooping after each other last summer, they're so huge and cool <3

[sholio]

Owl date!! Having clicked over to your post, what a cool experience for you! :D (And I hope the balcony bird was okay ...)

Yeah, I looked up owl calls afterwards and it was definitely an owl date, because the nearer one was a deep "HOO HOO HOO" and the farther had a lighter, twitter-ier quality, and from the recorded calls, the deeper was a female owl and the higher with a warble was a male. (Which goes to show what I get for making sexist assumptions about owls.) So I think it's likely that they were having a pleasant owlish nighttime hoot-off for spring baby-owl-making purposes. :D As you do, when you are an owl.

birb

[yhlee]

Eeeee!

Today I saw a pair of red cardinals in my garden!!

Re: birb

[sholio]

Oh, that's super cool though. :D

[sallymn]

That sounds like one of those small, but so evocative and always remembered moments...

[leesa_perrie]

What a wonderful experience!

[osprey_archer]

Oh, how lovely. An owl flying at night is one of the great sights of the world.

[greenwoodside]

Beautiful! I still smile at the memory of walking through a Welsh town at night and hearing a tawny owl hooting. These things stay with you.

[muccamukk]

That's very cool!

(We used to have one on campus that ate the rabbits, so you saw that a fair bit, but not NEARLY atmospheric as you describe!)

[lunabee34]

I've seen owls fly during the day and sitting in trees during the day but not flying at night. How cool!

[black_bentley]

OWLS! What a lovely thing to see. We get the odd barn owl here, I'm always ridiculously pleased to see them swooping about <333 (one landed on our balcony once and I was so excited that I could only point at it, and Mr BB enquired whether I was having some kind of stroke)

[sholio]

Oh, that would have been an INCREDIBLE experience, I would've done the same thing. :D

[sartorias]

Wow, that is SO cool!!!

[sheron]

:D!

[wateroverstone]

How lovely to see them . I lived by a wood with tawny owls for years but whilst I heard them most nights, I never managed to see them. I see the village barn owls out hunting occasionally which is lovely.

[sholio]

Oooh, that does sound like a lovely thing to see. :D

[wateroverstone]

I love seeing barn owls in the dark: there's something very otherworldly about them

[slippery_fish]

Oooh, that sounds so cool...

[hamsterwoman]

Such a cool experience!

We have great horned owls that used to nest in the park not far from here, and I occasionally hear them in the park even closer, but I've not seen them flight at night -- that sounds absolutely majestic!

[sholio]

That sounds so lovely to have them nesting nearby! I'm hoping that our owls are planning to nest around here, since it seems that they're sticking around. (I heard/saw it again tonight.)

[aelfgyfu_mead]

Wow!

[scintilla10]

Oooh, wow, that sounds amazing.

[yalumesse]

Awesome :)

[umadoshi]

<3 That sounds so neat!

[lokifan]

Oh, amazing! I'm jealous; I've seen a couple of tawny owls but I'd like to see a giant American one :)

[sholio]

They are BEEEEEG. But I haven't seen any other kinds and would love to!

[sophia_sol]

that's so cool! what a lovely thing to get to experience!!