Adventurous little owlet

As of yesterday, this little Great Horned Owl "branchling" seems to have become a nestling once again : ) It has experienced various adventures in the last 10 days or two weeks, but seems to be back on owlet schedule now. I guess we will never know what happened to start all this, though it is possible that this young one was blown out of the nest when we had several days of extremely strong winds recently.

This photo, from 24 April 2015, was taken when I called in very briefly at the park and found the owl on a high Spruce branch. Maybe it "missed" its two younger siblings, so returned to its place of origin : ) No activity from any of the owls, so the 10-minute "limit" on being there and taking photos was more than enough time for me to be there : ) Fully zoomed - Focal Length (35mm format) - 1200 mm.

Yesterday, on the way home from a great day with friends at Frank Lake, I called in at the park again for about half an hour. A bit more activity this time, with all three still together. I knew my "watching" time was up, but I also knew that the number of days before the Tax deadline were running out fast. Got my Taxes ready and finally fell into bed around 5:00 this morning!

"With its long, earlike tufts, intimidating yellow-eyed stare, and deep hooting voice, the Great Horned Owl is the quintessential owl of storybooks. This powerful predator can take down birds and mammals even larger than itself, but it also dines on daintier fare such as tiny scorpions, mice, and frogs. It’s one of the most common owls in North America, equally at home in deserts, wetlands, forests, grasslands, backyards, cities, and almost any other semi-open habitat between the Arctic and the tropics.

Great Horned Owls are nocturnal. You may see them at dusk sitting on fence posts or tree limbs at the edges of open areas, or flying across roads or fields with stiff, deep beats of their rounded wings. Their call is a deep, stuttering series of four to five hoots." From AllAboutBirds.

www.allaboutbirds.org/guide/Great_Horned_Owl/id

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_horned_owl