The Wildlife Center of Virginia in Waynesboro treats hundreds of injured animals every year, from possums, to eagles, to bear cubs. But one fledgling barn owl that fell from its nest in a grain silo in Augusta County has a unique story. WMRA's Meredith McCool reports.
Picture a farmer caring for his animals. You might envision him surrounded by cows, goats, pigs, or chickens. But one Augusta County farmer recently had the experience of caring for a barn owl who left his nest a little too soon.
Dr. Olivia Schiermeyer, Veterinary Research Fellow at the Wildlife Center of Virginia, worked with the farmer to re-nest the owl. She said the farmer –
SCHIERMEYER: …called us saying that there was an owlet on the ground that he saw fall from the silo. So then one of our vet interns, Dr. Liv, went out and brought it back to us for a full exam … radiographs, blood work, physical exam. Didn't find anything wrong with it, other than it was a very angry teenage owl who probably just failed at fledging. … Luckily, he was perfectly healthy. Just needed a little bit of a boost.
I met farmer and owl-rescuer Allen Strandberg at the silo with the hope of seeing the fledgling for myself. He opened a small hatch on the side of the silo and we peered inside, our voices echoing in the cavernous space.
McCOOL: Oh yeah, I see the feathers and–oh my gosh, so that's all–that's all owl pellets.
ALLEN STRANDBERG: Yep. Yeah see, they put him on that piece of equipment–
McCOOL: Okay.
STRANDBERG: –up there, and he hopped up because the nest is up in there. Usually, you can see him stick his head out.
McCOOL: So it's at the top of this stairway?
STRANDBERG: Yeah, up that way. But he fell down this whole thing.
McCOOL: Oh my gosh. Bless his heart. It's amazing that with all the stairs and everything that he wasn't injured.
STRANDBERG: Yeah, he might be out. They might be out trying to fly, because the sibling was in there, too. When they went in there, he was flying around.
SCHIERMEYER: This is pretty late in the year to be receiving baby owls. But barn owls are kind of weird, and they nest year-round, versus our other owls tend to only have babies in late winter, early springtime. So that's typically when we're seeing our baby owls. … It was weird to have a little fluffy baby here for even two days.
I asked Dr. Olivia how big the baby owl was. She held her hands apart about the length of a football.
SCHIERMEYER: In order to get it up the ladder, we put it in a backpack so we can safely get it up the ladder and onto the ledge. So I pulled it out of the backpack, so he's like, yeah, about that big and very fluffy.
McCOOL: How did the owl feel about being in the backpack?
SCHIERMEYER: Not pleased, not super pleased about it. I don't think he was pleased about the entire experience. But he didn't have to stay here, which is best interest for him, and he got to go back to his parents, who could take much better care of him than we could.
Barn owls also help take care of the farms where they tend to nest in barns and silos and hunt in adjacent fields. According to Dr. Olivia, barn owls are –
SCHIERMEYER: …extremely useful for farmers, because they help control rodent populations, so that you don't have to worry about as many rodents on your property. And in keeping with that, please don't use rodenticides, because when you poison the rats and mice, then the owls get poisoned, and generally they're anticoagulant rodenticides, which causes spontaneous bleeding. And we'll get them here and see a lot of bleeding. We can't do blood draws without them bleeding significantly. It takes a long time to treat, and sometimes we're not successful because they've already lost too much blood. So my only plea is, please, don't use rodenticides if you have barn owls around, or even if you don't, because it will poison the owls as well. And then you don't have your natural rodent control. And also, if you want to attract barn owls, you can build barn owl boxes and put them on the side of your barn.
As dusk descended on the farm, Allen and I stood in the warmth radiating from the barn, watching the cows and goats munch on hay while he told me about his daughters’ 4-H and FFA projects. Allen turned toward the silo. He’d heard the call of the young owl. He opened the hatch, and through the narrow beam of his flashlight, I caught a brief glimpse of silent white wings. For WMRA News, I'm Meredith McCool.
