Baby Barred Owl

This is a three-week-old Barred Owlet, really just a bundle of fluff that was too young to do anything : ) It and its only sibling were carefully shown to a group of us bird lovers and photographers, so this is not a "natural" photo, but a posed one.

On 4 June 2013, we had such a great day! I had been invited (and could bring a couple of friends) to go and see a family of tiny Northern Saw-whet Owls (with 6 owlets) and a family of Barred Owls (2 owlets) on private land up near Edmonton. It's a three-hour drive from Calgary north to Edmonton, and then the owls were a further half-hour drive. (We had just a very short drive between the two owl familes). Worth every minute of it to see these two species of beautiful owls! Thanks so much, Rob, for driving Phil and me up there.

The owls were a little younger than they might have been, but still so precious to see! As usual, we felt so privileged to get this wonderful chance! Richard showed us two of the six Saw-whet babies (and banded one of these that he hadn't yet banded), and both the Barred Owlets. One of the Saw-whets was only about a week old and the other was three weeks old. The Barred Owlets were very much bigger than the Saw-whets. The female adults of both families were high in fairly near, tall trees while this was going on, so we were very lucky to get photos of them, too. Trying to remember - I think I've only ever seen two Saw-whet owls in the wild, and this was the very first time I'd ever had the chance to see a Barred Owl in the wild : ) At long, long last - and it felt so good! I also got the chance to meet several people from Flickr, including Don Delaney and part of his "gang". Richard - we can't thank you enough for what you do (as a licenced Raptor Bander) and for sharing your love and knowledge of wildlife with others.

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Barred_Owl/id

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barred_Owl