Sunday, February 11, 2018

Urban Barred Owl at 12:30 AM

Yesterday morning at about 20 minutes after midnight, I was on my front step letting my dog answer one last call from nature before retiring for the evening.

Across the street, coming from the midst of a typical residential block, came the hoots of a Barred Owl! The call was atypical:  rather than the usual who cooks for you, who cooks for you-all, it was more like who cooks for you, who cooks.  

Here was a case where familiarity with a bird's tone or general vocal quality was important for making the identification- the hoots were recognizably those of a Barred Owl in clarity, pitch, etc- rather dog-like- even though their cadence was perhaps more like that of a Great Horned.  The latter usually gives a call a few phrases shorter than the classic Barred arrangement, but more deep and breath-y.   

Residential hoods are not typical Barred habitat, but they do wander into such areas sporadically in the winter.  The fact that I am just a few blocks from a pretty woodsy part of the batture probably helps.

I hooted back to it several times (I have been practicing imitating Barred Owls since I was a pre-teen- which is not unusual- it is probably the first owl that most birders learn to copy), and the bird seemed to be trading responses with me.  But it never adopted its standard call.