| David Brown's Wildlife Services 12 Hotel Road Warwick, MA 01378 Tel 978 544 8175 E-mail: info@dbwildlife.com |
| Encounters |
| "Tracking is seeing. Seeing is done with the mind." |
Tracking Problem:
Bird of the Month: Screech Owl
This site was in central Massachusetts
in a mixed hardwood forest. The trail
was under a fallen branch.
in a mixed hardwood forest. The trail
was under a fallen branch.
- What genus of mammal left this
trail? - Why was the trail located under
a branch? - What gait was the animal using
that resulted in the patterns in
the photograph? - Why was the animal using this
atypical gait? - What may have caused this
animal to move over the snow?
Screech owls actually don't
screech. Their calls are a haunting,
quavering whistle, sometimes
descending in scale, sometimes
staying on one pitch.
I call these cemetery owls because
they roost and nest so often in these
locations. Forestry practices typically
remove large trees before they suffer
rot in their interior and lose limbs, a
natural aging process that exposes the
hollow interior. However, this results in
a loss of roosting and nesting sites for
species, like screech owls, that
depend on tree cavities. Trees in
cemeteries, on the other hand, are
allowed to grow old beyond value, that
is, to all but the screech owl and other
species that depend upon such sites.
screech. Their calls are a haunting,
quavering whistle, sometimes
descending in scale, sometimes
staying on one pitch.
I call these cemetery owls because
they roost and nest so often in these
locations. Forestry practices typically
remove large trees before they suffer
rot in their interior and lose limbs, a
natural aging process that exposes the
hollow interior. However, this results in
a loss of roosting and nesting sites for
species, like screech owls, that
depend on tree cavities. Trees in
cemeteries, on the other hand, are
allowed to grow old beyond value, that
is, to all but the screech owl and other
species that depend upon such sites.