As of 4pm this afternoon, the owl has NOT been seen.

Mandy Martin (another DCP Naturalist) and I headed out there at 3pm and
organized a "field walk" that included many of the 15-20 people on site (this
was OK'd by the farmer & land owner).  We wanted to try to determine if the
owl was even present anymore.  We hiked a large portion of the area where
the owl had been seen yesterday and were unable to flush it.  It appears
that the owl is staying away from the known location (for now at least).

There have been numerous people there off and on since VERY early this
morning and if the owl is still in the area, this seems to be enough to keep
it from coming back... that, or the owl decided to leave last night, since
people there early this morning were unable to spot it.  Given the fact that
this area sees only limited traffic (a vehicle maybe every 15min) and very
little human interaction, the sudden influx of this many people could very
well cause the owl second thoughts upon returning to his "burrow".  There is
also the possibility that there is a second site that he has been using off
and on throughout the past week and this is where he is... basically, we
have no idea =)

At this time, I would NOT recommend anyone traveling out to the site.
 Especially if you have a long drive.

I will check the site upon returning to work tomorrow and throughout the day
if need be and will keep everyone posted.

Thanks to all who tried to spot him and who helped with the 'field walk'.

--
Robb Clifford
- Naturalist -

Darke County Parks
www.darkecountyparks.org

"We need another and a wiser, and perhaps a more mystical concept of
animals. Remote from universal nature and living by complicated artifice,
man in civilization surveys the creature through the glass of his knowledge
and sees thereby a feather magnified and the whole image in distortion. We
patronize them for their incompleteness, for their tragic fate of having
taken a form so far below ourselves. And therein we err, and greatly err.
For the animal shall not be measured by man. In a world older and more
complete than ours, they move finished and complete, gifted with extensions
of the senses we have lost or never attained, living by voices we shall
never hear. They are not brethren, they are not underlings; they are other
nations, caught with ourselves in the net of life and time, fellow prisoners
of the splendor and travail of the earth."
-Outermost House by Henry Beston-

______________________________________________________________________

Ohio-birds mailing list, a service of the Ohio Ornithological Society.
Our thanks to Miami University for hosting this mailing list.
Additional discussions can be found in our forums, at www.ohiobirds.org/forum/.

You can join or leave the list, or change your options, at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/scripts/wa.exe?LIST=OHIO-BIRDS
Send questions or comments about the list to: [log in to unmask]