A group of us were hunting snowshoe rabbits near Kennedy Springs some years back. It was the day after Christmas and we were all eager to get outside and exercise after the traditional huge Christmas feast and deluge of delicious, calorie laden desserts you simply had to try.
Larry Douthit and Max were there along with Max’s two boys Eric and Matt. Gus Crissman, his son Tim and I made up the rest of the party that day. The clear cut we parked beside was about five years old, the saplings six feet high and thick. As we climbed out of the trucks the temperature hovered in the 20’s and a low, gray covering of thick clouds rolled slowly over us. We loaded our shotguns and immediately were wading through the deep snow and thick saplings stomping on brush piles and kicking old treetops in an attempt to flush out a snowshoe or two. It was great exercise and in an hour we’d managed to bag a rabbit or two.
I came puffing around a low rock, stopped and stared. There in front of me sat a miniature owl on a low limb only two feet above the ground. A large star nosed mole dangled from the tiny claws, but those claws must have done their job for the mole was certainly very dead.
The owl was smaller than I thought an owl could be, but there was no denying what sat before me. I called out to everyone to come and see, soon an excited circle of hunters had stomped over for a look at this amazing bird. The tiny owl never moved, just sat there calmly with his new caught dinner until we moved off again. I couldn’t wait to get home and see just what type of owl we’d encountered.
My trusty field guide to North American Birds soon informed me that the tiny, robin sized owl was a Northern Saw-whet owl, Aegolius acadicus. This small predator has an oversized head on top of a robin-sized body with adults weighing around 3.6 ounces. The face is catlike, the eyes a bright yellow and despite its small size the owl is filled with an intense and fierce disposition. To kill the mice, moles and voles it feeds upon and weigh as much as the owl itself, takes some attitude! The owls consume their large prey, large to them anyway, over 2 or 3 meals. Deer mice are their most common quarry.
Few people have seen Saw-whet owls, yet they are one of the most common owls across North America. Highly nocturnal and preferring thick evergreen forests their small size and preference for staying low in the trees makes them difficult to spot.
However, from January to May they can oftentimes be heard on quiet nights. Their sharp, high, often repeated too-too-too may be heard near thicker cover, often for hours on end. You may be able to discover a Saw-whet if they’re resting spot’s discovered by small song birds. They’ll raise a real ruckus until they force the owl to move, much as crows harass hawks and larger owls.
Many bird species have different roles when it comes to parenting and raising the family and Saw-whets, not surprisingly, have their own way of doing things. The mother lays her eggs, 5-6, rarely nine, in a hollow tree cavity, usually an abandoned flicker or Pileated Woodpecker hole. She incubates the eggs for 27 to 29 days when they hatch. When the youngest is about 18 days old she leaves the nest to help hunt and feed the chicks or may seek out another mate and raise a second family. Like most of the female sex she keeps the nest immaculate the initial 18 days, tossing out feces and left over pieces of mice, hair, bone, etc., as the father does all the hunting. Then, feeling her job’s complete, leaves the brood to the old man. Perhaps, some human mothers might feel this is pretty smart move on her end.
The male continues to hunt and bring mice to the nest, but like many men, is a pretty big slob when it comes to housework. He doesn’t clean a thing and by the time the fledglings leave the nest 10 days to two weeks later, the nest is filled with debris, a real mess. The young owls hang around the nest site for another four weeks, fed in most cases by the male though occasionally some mothers do help.
Many bird chicks are very competitive, fighting to get the most food from the parents. In fact cowbirds, brood parasites, lay their eggs in another birds nest and their young quickly outgrow the native chicks and eliminate them.
Saw-whet chicks fall into neither of the above categories, actually helping feed one another in the mother’s absence. Ah, a refreshing change.
As the winter advances Saw-whets migrate south. Not a lot is known about the maximum distances traveled, but 90 to 100 miles is common, one owl actually landing on a ship 80 miles from land. I’d suspect he had a faulty compass or, most likely, was caught in some violent winds and blown out to sea.
Saw-whets can live to be approximately nine years old.
So there you have it, if you see a tiny owl it’s not your imagination, but a common, though rarely seen, Saw-whet.
