Bill is right on with this post. I am not trying to do a story out do here ,
but i just went  out to get my
mail. Layed the mail down and scraped some ice /snow in front of the door.
There were about 6 TV's there in the edge of the woods ,, after a road kill
deer that is there. I was scraping and crows were carrying on. I looked up
there and saw a large bird swoop in,, had a white tail !!! hahaa , Yes a
Bald Eagle right by my house. He is in the woods and I hope I can get some
good photos.  I got a couple bad ones  Russell  Lima, Ohio

----- Original Message -----
From: "Bill Whan" <[log in to unmask]>
To: "Russowl" <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 2:34 PM
Subject: Re: [Ohio-birds] possible long-eared owl, Columbus


> Yeah, they're WAY better than we are at detecting owls!
> Bill
>
>
> On 2/23/2011 10:49 AM, Russowl wrote:
>> That is a tried and true method here for me, I also listen to the
>> Bluejays.
>> Had Bluejays carrying on in one of the pine groves in Killdeer Plains and
>> sure enough there was Long Ears there 3 of them. Have had crows and Jays
>> point out Owls to Eagles here, Russell Lima, Ohio
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Bill Whan" <[log in to unmask]>
>> To: <[log in to unmask]>
>> Sent: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 10:29 AM
>> Subject: Re: [Ohio-birds] possible long-eared owl, Columbus
>>
>>
>>> Dave as usual showed excellent birding instincts here, and the rest
>>> of
>>> us ought to emulate. Both crows and raptors, including owls, have been
>>> increasing in numbers in urban settings in recent decades. Winters are
>>> warmer in the city. Shooting is forbidden. Food is easier to
>>> find--everything from dumpster treasures, to feeders crowded with
>>> smaller birds, to little Fluffy abroad at night. Tree stands are
>>> maturing, and big old trees with cavities are more often allowed to
>>> stand these days.
>>> Crows are a lot better at finding owls than we are, and they do a
>>> noisy
>>> job of it, worth paying attention to. Here in Clintonville it's not too
>>> hard to find screech-owls, great horned owls, and barred owls just by
>>> listening at night this time of year, especially if you crack a bedroom
>>> window. Long-eareds and saw-whets are much less often detected. There
>>> are small numbers of nesting records of saw-whets in the city; in their
>>> much more likely role as migrants these small owls are fond of thick
>>> cover, tough to flush, and crows don't mind them as much, but we
>>> occasionally come across them in Clintonville.
>>> Long-eareds are even more of a mystery; they nested here when
>>> open-country hunting grounds were available. We have records of snowy
>>> and short-eared owls only from decades ago when we had more fields. Our
>>> eighth species, the barn owl, has many old records here, but none in
>>> recent decades, having suffered as well from habitat loss; in the old
>>> days, it nested in hollow sycamores along the Olentangy with nearby
>>> meadows, but no more.
>>> Anyway, city-dwellers in older tree-dominated neighborhoods might
>>> be
>>> surprised how many owls share the habitat with us...especially if we
>>> don't press them too hard.
>>> Bill Whan
>>> Columbus
>>>
>>> p.s. Check out Bernd Heinrich's new book (Harvard Univ Press 2010), "The
>>> Nesting Season: Cuckoos, Cuckolds, and the Invention of Monogamy"!
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> On 2/23/2011 8:00 AM, Dave Horn wrote:
>>>> Hello Ohio Birders,
>>>>
>>>> Timing is everything. While taking the trash to the curb this
>>>> morning (7:15am) I was distracted by 50-60 crows mobbing my
>>>> neighbor's spruce tree. After about 5 minutes an owl flew out and
>>>> headed southward. I did not have a decent look at the usual field
>>>> marks but it had the slim, long-winged look of a long-eared rather
>>>> than the chubby barred owl silhouette, and it was too small for a
>>>> great horned. (Barred and great horned both occur in the
>>>> neighborhood.)
>>>>
>>>> I live on Arden Rd. in the first block east of High St. in the
>>>> Clintonville area. The bird flew in the direction of East North
>>>> Broadway on a straight course, with a few crows in pursuit.
>>>>
>>>> I'll keep an eye on my neighbor's tree, and other Clintonville
>>>> birders might be on the lookout.
>>>>
>>>> Happy birding,
>>>>
>>>> Dave Horn Columbus
>>>>
>
>
>
> -----
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