Owls make such interesting and magical subjects to photograph. Most times when you are out hiking and you are lucky enough to stumble across an owl it will be peacefully sleeping, and basking in the sunlight. It doesn't happen all the time but once you learn about raptor behaviors you can begin to look for them during their most active hours. Luckily in Ontario (that’s home for me) most of our owls are diurnal. Meaning they do wake up and hunt during the daytime. It's during these moments that these sweet looking puffed up cuties, show off their homicidal perfection. My first owl experience was so interesting, it had me heading straight to google to look up the strange behavior I had witnessed. I had just started taking pictures, I was focused on landscapes as I only had a 18-55mm lens. Wildlife was something I enjoyed seeing but shooting it (with the camera of course) was out of reach for me. I was out walking at 7 am in fresh fallen snow. I managed to be the first boots in the picture perfect snow and set off to find a wicked landscape. Almost immediately I had a visitor, a barred owl decide to fly right into the tree in front of me. I watched him for a few minutes taking a couple shots and shocked at 55mm I was able to get ok shots (that is how close he flew in). I thought he must not like me here so I should move on. I put my camera in my bag to make me walking by as stealthy as possible. To my surprise, as I walked he followed me, tree to tree. I thought I wonder if people feed him and he was looking for a free meal. I kept walking stopping briefly every time he found a new perch. Suddenly he was looking at me really strange, moving his head around and leaning forward. Again I put the camera away thinking I was bothering him. This time as soon as I zipped the bag he flew from the tree and dove into the snow not even two feet away from me. I thought omg he’s sick or injured, something must be wrong here. He sat and stared at me with these big eyes for a long pause, then he flew. In his claws was a big fat rat, a rat that had been moving under the snow right where I was walking. I left this experience thinking I had disturbed the owls hunting and he was lucky to have caught some breakfast with me there. After the google search I found out how wrong I was, and finally understood what that owl was doing. The owl was using me to hunt. They are so smart they will adapt their hunting styles to their surroundings. You will find that Barred owls in particular will use larger animals (usually deer and such) to startle their prey. When the voles and mice move away from the approaching vibration of the footsteps the owls have no trouble spotting them in every terrain. This obviously wise owl knew how to work this instinct in a well used park. He learned people feed the birds frequently in this park, the seed brings the rodents in close to hopefully get a little treat as well. The rodents will come out to the trails to see if people walking by have left any good treats for them. While checking the area out the rodents will often retreat when a person gets too close. This is what the owl was looking for, the sudden movements alerted the owl to the rodents location. I was hooked, I just helped an owl hunt and didn’t even know it. Since this experience I have only seen this behavior one other time and have been out hiking and actively studying owl behavior for years now. This was one of those horseshoe kind of moments and started a love of these beautiful raptors for me. The very next day I went out and purchased a 55-250 mm lens and went back for the first image attached here. Included is a small group of owl photographs I have taken over the years, as you see every year since when the weather starts to get a little colder you can find me hitting the trails and finding all the beauty I can. Note; I do support ethical education, rehabilitation and breeding programs, some photographs within my blog are taken in captive settings.
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