Saw-Whet Owl

This little fellow was found this summer season after he hit a window... terribly hard.  His right side was badly bruised and it initially appeared that the wing and/or leg might have been broken.  Luckily, this was not the case and amazingly he had not sustained a severe head trauma either. 

I am always amused when people call me and say they have found a baby owl.  Saw-Whets, fully grown, are only about 8” tall. They are by far, one of the gentlest creatures on earth.  They will demonstrate “ferocious” defensive behaviors but are laughable, really. Initially, I had trouble feeding him.  Typical behavior for raptors is to not identify with the feeder mice which are delivered frozen to St. Francis.  They are white and raptors have only seen dark-colored mice in the wild.  After trying a few different methods (which I shall not go into) he finally figured things out and was eating on his own in very short order.  I put him in a small flight cage so he could get his muscle strength back.

Two weeks later, he was ready to be released.  We did the release around dusk at the home of the couple who had initially found him. We chose that time of day as these birds are strictly nocturnal.  Our little Saw-Whet flew straight to a nearby tree. I’m sure he sat to wait for the next normal colored mouse to come along.