You too! đ
My pleasure! They have some very amazing anatomy!
I would lose it đ€Ł
That was pretty good actually! đ
I think it would be a good conversation starter or ice breaker đź
Rare UK Owl Sighting!
From Dave Newman
14 only ever recorded in the UK and 2 in Lincolnshire, the Dark Breasted Barn Owl from this morning.
What a display â€ïžâ€ïžâ€ïž
40 more pics in this set for anyone not avoiding Facebook...
I tried to grab you guys a decent sample of what the photographer had.
Bunny Hop!
From Fei Cheng
Burrowing Owl - A little feather ball floating in the air đ„°
March, 2025 Central WA
Bunny Ears
From National Centre for Birds of Prey
"See the prey, feel the prey, BE the prey!" Harley doing his best bunny rabbit impression for Easter.
Those big feathery tufts on Harley's head are actually called "plumicorns" (literally "feather horns") and are used for camouflage and communication with other owls.
Harley, Eurasian eagle owl
Happy Easter, 420 Day, or just plain old happy Sunday to all of you!
Why can they:
They have 14 cervical vertebrae instead of 7 like we do. They're coiled like a spring and surrounded with air pockets and blood vessels to allow extreme rotation without choking themselves out or hurting themselves.
Why do they do that:
Owl eyes aren't spherical, they're shaped like a light bulb with the big part on the inside of their head, so there's no room for the eyes themselves to move, so if they want to look anywhere but straight ahead, they need to move their entire head.
They also see with their ears as much or more than their eyes. Their faces are parabolic to act as a big sounds collector and one ear is higher than the other in a lot of owl species to generate a 3D mental image of the sound, somewhat like Daredevil. This is how they "see" in the absence of light, or under leaves or snow to find prey.
The rotation like this photo, or if you've seen them bobbing and weaving their head is just them fine tuning and really trying to get finer details on that sound map, getting really precise readings in whatever sound they're investigating.
The line inspector was off his game that day.
He's my local representative. He's a pretty interesting guy. All his campaign stuff talks about him being the most independent politician in the country.
He's supported quite a number more Democrat legislation than most Republicans would like, but him and his brother before him have held a solid lock on our district's voting for 20 years.
He does enough to keep both sides of the aisle at least happy enough he wins by a healthy margin all the time. I'd much rather we had a progressive, but we're a solidly mixed district with about 50/50 R vs D voters.
His wiki has a few of the good things he's done, but he's also voted against the Trump impeachment and in favor of the Biden impeachment inquiry, so he's still a Republican first and foremost. He is about the best Republican we have though, so take that as you will. I vote against him every time, but compared to some of our other Republican reps here, we could do much worse.
I'm sure a good deal of it is just that like being lazy and complaining. đ
I got some good posts added to the queue today and planted some more stuff in my container garden and made some bread, so now to clean dishes and laundry and try to focus on some piano.
I think I've been lost since the gf has gone to a very fluctuating schedule, as it really throws off my routines. It's like if the sun came out at a different time every day. There's still the same amount of time and opportunity to do stuff, but you'd feel off after a while doing stuff at what feels like the wrong time of day. I dunno. I'm weird. đ
I have no clue! đ
That's the drawback of there being so much great free music stuff these days! You can get lost playing and never actually finish anything.
I haven't used Cakewalk. It seems very powerful, but I see people say it's one of the harder DAWs to learn.
I also hear Sonar discontinued Cakewalk Free and is moving to a paid license, though that was 2 years ago and Free is still available I think, but I don't know if it's being maintained any longer.
Thank you! We're still on top, but it isn't over yet!
Love all the continuing support!
As hard as it may be to imagine, I feel I've been getting a bit behind from where I'd like to be with owl stuff. With so many owl babies right now, it's been hard to get some of the variety I'd like, and between being sick and depressed, it's hard for me to focus on owls or music the way I'd like.
But between all those links I've shared, you should have years worth of experimentation ahead of you. I hope you find lots of good stuff.
Leafy Tree
From Mike Kilberg
Barred owls love big leafy trees as a great roosting spot. This barred owl particularly loves this tree as it has a nice view of the nest location.
Maryland 4/9/25
Fuzzy Memories
From Harold Wilion
Taken last week, I don't think anyone has posted this owl for a while. The photo is certainly not unique, but I figured if your memory is as bad as mine, you won't remember, so figured I'd throw it out there.
A Look of Concern
From Freedom First
This is Maple's reaction when I wear something new... in this case it was a headband. She fluffs out and will not look away..so concerned! Lol
(Maple is in an indoor cage waiting for her annual physical before returning outside to her aviary
Gotcha, now I have a better idea of what you're trying to do.
Watching this video about looping in LMMS shows it can sorta be done, sometimes with some help from Audacity.
If you're adding in more stuff like VST plugins and vocals, you may want to try out Waveform Free, which I checked is for iOS also, so you get a full modern DAW. It's the same product as their paid full version, just like 2 updates behind.
For more premade loops, check out Looperman if you haven't already.
It's not free, but I think I under $20 for the program and all the upgrades, if looping and sampling is something you want to focus on, check out Koala Sampler. I downloaded it the other week and have been sampling vinyl recordings from YouTube, it has an AI stem extractor to separate the instrument tracks, and then chopping and looping that.
It has a built in simple synth now as well, and you can use a midi controller with it. Lots of videos are out there if you want to see how that works. You might be able to incorporate that into your setup.
The Adaptable, Continental Great Horned Owl (and an interesting discovery about snowshoe hares!)
A great horned owl chick perches on the trans-Alaska pipeline near Wiseman. (Photo by Ned Rozell)
By Ned Rozell | Alaska Science Published: April 11, 2025
Reader Todd Mackinaw recently admired how the great horned owl can thrive from the Brooks Range in Alaska all the way to Uruguay in South America.
The knee-high owl, known for its âplumicornsâ â tufts above its ears that resemble horns â haunts every forested bit of Alaska.
Right about now, in early April, many female great horned owls are sitting on nests they have borrowed from other large birds â no owls build their own nest) Or they are warming eggs atop witchesâ brooms â dense tangles of spruce branches caused by a fungus.
*A female great horned owl sits on eggs on part of the chapel building
Extreme Home Makeover
From WRA of Rhode Island
On Monday, we responded to a call about a young great horned owl in distress. Its nest had completely fallen, leaving the fragile chick displaced and vulnerable. Wild babies are always best raised by their parents, so renesting was our top priority. However, rebuilding a nest 30 feet up in a tree is no small task. In the world of wildlife rehabilitation, collaboration is everything, so we turned to our incredible colleagues at A Place Called Hope, renowned experts in raptor rehabilitation. Each year, they successfully perform over 20 renests throughout CT, and without hesitation, they agreed to help us.
On Tuesday, our teams met, and with skill and precision, the APCH crew raised and secured a newly built platform nest high in the tree, carefully placing the young back where they belonged. All the while, the parents remained nearby,
Before They Learn to Fly, They Learn to Climb
I photographed this baby Great Horned Owl in Pennsylvania, USA.
This was my first time seeing a baby owl climate tree.
Baby great horned owls are huge compared to a baby barred owl.
Again, if you see an owl on the ground, please give it space so it can hop, skip, and jump to the nearest tree to climb it!
This cutie was well monitored for two days by everybody in the community and on the second day, he climbed seven trees and once he finally found a sturdy one he stayed in it for 18 hours.
I have photos of this darling roosting in people's daffodils.
People in Pennsylvania are extra extraordinary, literally everyone was pro-owl, meaning it wasn't about the shot everyone wanted, to make sure the owl was OK. People opened up their homes to me, and their hearts. It was a life-altering experience, owl and hum
Hey, Watch What You're Doing!
From Harry Collins
This little burrowing owlet picked the wrong place to relax while momma was cleaning out the burrow.
Solitude Interrupted
From Luc Claes
Petit-duc Ă face blanche - Ptilopsis leucotis - Northern White-faced Owl
Something to Remember Me By
From Pocono Wildlife Rehab Center
This is one of our recent rehab successes, a beautiful gray morph screech owl.
Not ready to immediately disappear into the woods, the little screech perched on Amanda's hand for several minutes, taking in the scenery....then pooped on her and flew off. Message fully received that she was done with us and ready to be free again!
Fun fact, owls have amazing vision, and their pupils can dilate independently from each other (as this owl was kind enough to demonstrate.
Winking Owl
From DP Nature and Wildlife Photography
Brown Fish Owl.. Excellent at hiding due to its camouflaging ability.. If you see close enough you will see that it is cleaning it's second eye' lens using its nictitating membrane..
Photographed in the Himalayan Jungles at Sattal, Uttarakhand - India
Now Throw Your Hands Up and Say... Get the Heck Off Me, Lady!
From Wild Heart Ranch
GHO getting some physical therapy for atrophied leg muscles.
Distraction Tabs
From Wild Care Oklahoma
Today, we are highlighting a simple but common treatment we use in our wildlife veterinary clinic-distractions tabs!
Often when raptors have a bone fracture in their wing, we place wing wraps to immobilize the bone while it heals. Sometimes our patients are not appreciative of their treatments, and they will try their best to get the wraps off. Barred owls and great-horned owls are the biggest offenders. In these cases, we add extra tape as "distraction tabs" for them to pull on instead of their actual wrap. This extends the integrity of the wrap.
You can see in these tabs on this barred owl that is in care for a metacarpal fracture and the great-horned owl caught in the act of pulling on his tabs
Pallid Scops
From Nick Bray
Wadi Tanuf, Oman, March 2025
Found between the Arabian Peninsula and Pakistan and Afghanistan, the Pallid Scops is similar to the Eurasian Scops, but a little plainer in patterning and with a deeper vocalization.
I didn't see too much info out there on this little one, but it's always fun to explore the diversity of the many Scops owls of the world.
They Make Flying Look So Easy
From Phil Nind
A month ago I was seeing photographs on fb/insta and thinking how I'd love to see let alone photograph a wild > barn owl.......
Fast forward to yesterday and I went back for my 3rd visit to a local meadow and captured this image. Really happy with this one.
Just goes to show if you put in the time and effort, learn from mistakes, listen to advice you'll reap the rewards.
SijĂș: Native Owl of Cuba
From Paul Bannick
Cuban Pygmy-Owl (Glaucidium siju)
A Cuban Pygmy-Owl pauses at his nest entrance with a gecko for his young, Like other Pygmy-Owls it typically nests in the cavities created by woodpeckers but unlike the Northern Pygmy-Owl it will also utilize nest boxes like the one featured in this photo.
This and the Bare Legged Owl are Cuba's 2 native owls.
Though the largest owl ever known, the Cuban Giant Owl, used to live there as well, just the tiny ones remain today.
The Cuban Pygmy Owl is also known as the sijĂș, pronounced see-HOO. A very owlish name, but this owl doesn't seem to make a hooting sound.