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Subject:

earthquake, 4 owls, and now a hurricane!

From:

Jeff Shenot

Reply-To:

Jeff Shenot

Date:

Fri, 26 Aug 2011 22:05:41 -0400

What a week.   I was working out of town for a couple days and am just getting around to posting this.  I was here on Tuesday, working at my office in Silver Spring on the top floor of a very tall building when the earthquake hit.  I mention it because it was very unsettling (no pun intended!).  And that evening a very weird thing happened.  I had never experienced an earthquake, and am pretty sure that all the owls around here have not either.  Well that night they all seemed to be extraodinarily talkative, as if they all HAD to talk about something!  It has been VERY quiet owl-wise here lately up til now!

To begin with my wife told me she heard 2 different species calling when she was out in the barn doing chores (~ 7:00-8:00 pm).  She's not a birder and this is not as exciting to her as it is to me, but she knew I would be excited.  She came in to tell me and said go out and check!  She was pretty sure one was a screecher and the other a great horned.  I went out to check, but all I heard was two Great Horns, a male and a female.  I wondered if she somehow thought the two Gr horneds were different sp., so I asked her what call she thought the screecher made.  She described the whistle trill perfectly (not the whinny), so I was pretty sure she heard a screech.  I tried again at 9:00 but it was quiet.

At 10:00 when I took the dog out, it was crazy!  I heard two barreds, two great horns, and a barn owl, all calling nearly simultaneously.  I had never heard 3 species calling at the same time before, it was very cool.  I didn't hear a screech, but was pretty confident my wife did.  This evening (my first at home since then), I heard a screecher blasting away from the edge of the yard (the whinny call) at about 7:30 pm!

I can say with pretty good confidence that we had 4 species of owls here on Tuesday, a daily record for our property.  I am thinking their extraordinary calling had something to do with the earthquake, but of course will never know.

Did anyone else notice any unusual owl calling activity Tuesday night?

As for tomorrow, Maryland may be watching Irene from the front row.  I hope all MDOspreyers fare safely and well.  And I really hope the storm's damage is not devastatign to our beloved coastal habitats that we all enjoy watching birds in.  Yes, I will be watching for a state bird or a new yard bird, but let's hope we get lucky enough to escape severe habitat impacts.

Best regards-
Jeff Shenot
Croom MD

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