This Barred Owl hung around my backyard most of yesterday during the snowstorm-ice storm. I was on a deadline to finish revising a third chapter for the week, hoping to turn them in to a writing partner by 5pm.
Whenever I’d dig into my manuscript though, the owl would swoop around the backyard and back into the woods, having me up from my computer, running from window to window with my camera, looking for it all over again.
The owl It was always perched juuuuust into the woods enough for me to know it was there, but not have a good photo opportunity. It was a grey day, which is hard enough to take photos in, but the owl kept to the shadows of the pine boughs, too. I actually watched it hop branch to branch to stalk a frequent visitor to our feeder, a squirrel with half a tail. It was almost like a half hour game of cat and mouse. Fascinating! I’m happy to report, the squirrel won! I think it has nine lives, that one.
I’d just about given up on seeing the owl fully, when about 3:30 it swooped for my feeder full of Mourning Doves. Again it came up empty. But I didn’t!
I have a two hour delay at school today due to icy roads. And here I sit, sipping coffee and watching the woods for the familiar huge wing span. I wonder if that Barred Owl ever did find dinner last night?