Hello!
Today I want to talk about the largest owl in the Americas -
The Great Horned Owl
Photo taken at Mountsberg Raptor Centre; WordPress.com
Or is it the largest?
Well, that depends.
It depends on whether you are talking
height,
weight,
wingspan
or male or female!
If you are counting height as the largest,
then the Great Grey Owl is tallest
at 24” - 33”
averaging 27 inches.
But…
Posted by Nataly Paige, Pinterest
Great Horned Owl in flight
If you are counting wingspan as the largest
then the Great Horned Owl is biggest!
(Except for the exceptions of course.)
Great Horned Owl
Wingspan: 3-5 feet
Weight average: 1.4 kg
Height: average 22 inches
Female is quite a bit heavier.
Great Grey Owl
Wingspan: 1-5 feet
(Averages at just under 3 feet)
Weight average: 1.1 kg
Height: average 27 inches high
Problem:
Different web sites and different experts
have different opinions on these numbers!
Overall however The Great Horned Owl seemed to have the most votes as the largest owl in the Americas,
and is one of the top 4 largest owls in the world.
And I have one that sits on my fence every night
And I have one that sits on my fence every night
12 midnight
and hoots away for up to 35 minutes!
Wow.
Shannon Holder, Pinterest
sometimes just as the sun is rising.
Sometimes he sits on our roof.
In the very early Spring he will sit on our fence
and hoot…
and then we hear a second hoot
from a different owl!
His mate is vocalizing with him!
They have mated since early January.
Every year they use a nest across the street from us.
It is on the top of a very high pole.
Great Horned Owls generally do not build their own nests. They like to use other raptors’ nests,
such as an eagle’s or a hawk’s nest
that are built out of sticks.
A GHO nest usually has 2-4 eggs in it.
The GH Owls are very adaptable and can live just about anywhere- orchard, desert, forest, woodland, or swamp.
I believe this is probably part of the reason they are not currently endangered - because they have learned how to adapt to their surroundings.
In the wild Great Horned Owls live about 13 years.
In capture most GHO have a lifespan of
around 29 years.
Owlets (baby owls!) have only a 50% chance of surviving.
All owls are protected though,
and it is a punishable crime to hurt or kill one.
Owls can see in almost complete darkness.
The large facial disks around the eyes actually funnel sound waves to the owl’s ears.
They have excellent hearing.
An owl has an almost silent flight.
This is due to the shape of their feathers.
They have a home range of about 1.5 square miles,
and do not migrate.
I have some fun owl things to do next.
A coloring page for you -
A mask for you to color and cut out -
Here are a couple different ways you can draw your own owl -
You know I love zentangles, so I must include a couple of those!
Unique coloring book page (mohiminul12)
Want to draw your own?
You can use this outline to start -
Muse Printables
This next one is an embroidery pattern from Workbasket magazine
August, 1981 -
Here is a tuck-quilt kit -
Tuck-N-Go Crafts
You can get these adorable crochet owls from Moji-Moji Designs -
I hope you have learned something new about these wonderful owls,
I know I have!
‘Til next time,
inkspired
Artist Robert Bateman
Some of the websites I gathered information from, in no particular order:
fieldguide.my.gov
zooidaho.org
5dzwildlifeexplorers.org
Pinterest
great horned owl.net
Wikipedia.org
abcbirds.org
No comments:
Post a Comment