The great horned owl is the largest resident owl in the Times News region. The female reaches about 22 inches in length with the males just a bit smaller. Great horned owls are fierce and feared predators. They hunt prey from as small as mice to birds or mammals their own size.

They are so feared that seldom do you find any other owl species in their territory. They could be eaten as well. Like almost all bird species, the great horned owl has a poor sense of smell, and because of its size it makes skunks one of its normal prey species.

The horned owls don’t build their own nests and usually claim a hawk nest or crow nest and make a few modifications. They seldom reuse the same nest the next year. However, the nest I followed last spring was used two consecutive years.

Owls are not very “popular” with crows or hawks. If crows find a roosting owl during the day they will “mob” it. The racket begins with three or four crows and eventually a dozen or more crows join in the “party” and this boisterous pesting may continue for a half hour or longer.

Crows will dive at the owl, sometimes even hitting it. Sometimes the owl tires of being harassed and it will fly to a safer area. Hawks will dive bomb them as well. The crows are so intent on driving the owl from the woods that a number of times I have been able to walk up within 50 yards of them until finally a scout crow alerts the group and they and the owl fly away.

To help you find an active owl nest, look for whitewash (their pasty droppings) on forest floor or even on nearby limbs. While hawks meticulously pluck a bird’s feathers before feeding on it, the owls will swallow feathers, bones, fur and in the case of small prey, even the head.

Later the owl, after digesting what it can, will “cough up”/regurgitate the small bones, feathers and anything else undigestible. These pellets will usually be lying under or near the nest or roost. So a large number of pellets can help you find a nest too.

In barn owls, most of their nest in a barn or steeple is made up of these pellets with the eggs lying among them.

Great horned owls are currently rather vocal just before dawn and again about dusk. The males and females will call to help solidify their pair bonds in anticipation of nesting. The deeper owl hoot is made by the male and it is quite “neat” listening to their calling each other. Often the first egg is laid by the first week of February. Unlike a robin which waits to warm the eggs when the clutch is complete, the owl begins incubating immediately. Thus the second hatching will be about two or three days younger than its nest mate. In lean years with not enough food for the young, the older, bigger owlet may kill and eat its nest mate.

Great horned owls until 1965 were hunted legally because a bounty was given for killing one. My father remembers many of his friends shooting and trapping them.

Test Your Outdoor Knowledge: In Pennsylvania until the middle of the 20th century, bounties were paid for all of these except: A. red fox, B. weasels, C. goshawks, D. barn owls, E. gray fox.

Last Week’s Trivia: A large group of ducks on a body of water is called a raft of ducks.

Contact Barry Reed at breed71@gmail.com.