Owl-tastic

As I've said before, I'm lucky to work at a place which has some reasonably natural areas, with basically no urban development. I regularly walk through these areas, and once in a while I see some great wildlife scenes. On the even rarer times when I remember to take a camera along, I can capture the scene.



My best moment so far was finding two owls perched together over a small creek on September 3rd. I'd seen a single owl several times perched near the same location, and some bird-watchers had told me they had spotted an owl's nest nearby as well. I had imagined it to be a solo owl nest, so imagine my surprise when I saw two next to each other! I actually ran all the way back to my office to get my camera, and the pair was still there when I got back for this photo (in fact they had gotten a little closer!). This is a pair of barred owls, which is common in North America. I assume they are pair-bonded, but I never saw any owlets. The fact that they are out of the nest together suggests that, if the pair reared any owlets, they are now out of the nest. This was probably a relaxing evening out for them! (please see OwlCam and their wonderful DVD to find out more about their young-rearing cycle). Just after I took this photo, one owl flew away, and then about a minute later the other owl flew right over my head to another perch. They were very silent.



The next day I did remember to take my camera, and caught this fox crossing the road. I've seen the same fox at the same place several times, so this is his local hunting grounds. He spotted me while I was setting up for the photo, thankfully posed, and then walked off into the brush on the side of the road. There is a nearby pond, so I suspect he has lots of frogs, birds and ducks to go after.



Of course, there are the ever present deer. This photo was taken last year when there were a lot of deer seen roving the workplace, even in the more urbanized parts. This year, however, the deer have been a lot more scarce. Perhaps they have been removed or lured away by maintenance staff. However, today I came across a herd of eight deer, about three does and six fauns, which is the most I've ever seen at one time! They were very close to the trail and I walked right past. The largest doe stared me down, stomped her hoof and snorted, but I held my ground too. The others retreated into the forest.


Here's another shot from last year, with a smaller herd near the edge of the forest. There is a feeder on-site for deer, which is supposed to reduce the number of ticks and tick-borne disease, and this photo was taken near that feeder.

(Previously, previously.)

(Sorry about the image quality, but all of these photos are taken near dusk with a cheap consumer camera with few manual settings. The red-eye is due to flash. Non-flash photos are hopelessly blurry due to long exposure times.)