January 26 2019. Newmarket, ON. My occasional volunteering for the Owl Foundation took a new turn today; I was asked to take and release a Barred Owl. It had been found in an urban area north and east of Toronto, grounded and suffering some relatively minor head and eye damage; I don’t know all the details except that with some treatment it had recovered and was ready to go back to where it belonged.
We were asked to make the release around dusk and to stay well away from the intensive urbanisation where it was found. I asked a couple of birder-friends to join me, it meant a lot of driving: 60 kilometres one way to get the owl; 130 in almost the opposite direction to its release point, and then home.
It was all very simple; the owl was placed gently into a cat carrier which was covered with a light sheet. With the help of Google Maps I selected a roadside release spot close to thick woodland with few houses anywhere around. We made the long drive arriving, appropriately, around 4.30, pulled off the road, set down the carrier and opened it. The owl walked out hesitantly, liked what it saw and flew to a nearby tree. It looked at us for a several minutes, then turned and flew further into the forest.
It was a very quiet road but a car passed us as we were doing the release. It stopped, turned around and the family of three sat mesmerized just looking at our Barred owl, something few people get to enjoy. I think they became converts to owl rescue, thanking us over and over.
All of that was straightforward enough. Our biggest surprise though came a few minutes and a couple of kilometers earlier, before arriving at the release spot, when another Barred Owl flew across the road in front of us. It landed on a roadside tree to our left where, despite our travelling speed, we were able to see it clearly.
Two Barred Owls – two Birds of the Day.