The Owl

Last night we mowed the driveway path with the finish mower and it looks great.  It was about dusk when the tractor was put up we decided to drive the path and on the way to the where our house will be Judith grabbed my arm and was stammering to get out “STOP!”  She was looking at a huge bird on the last fence post driveway marker.  She thought it was an owl, but I thought it looked like a hawk.  We watched it for a couple of minutes and discussed its size, somewhere between 18 and 24 inches tall we decided.  We moved closer in the truck to get a better look and as we eased up, probably still 30 yards away his head swiveled what seemed like 180° and he looked right at us!  We froze!  We could see his dark eye sockets when his head swiveled, and his coloring was brown with just a tinge of red in it.  We watched him for about 2 minutes, but it seemed like forever as he sat there with his head spinning around, then he looked like he tried to grab something off the ground, then lit in a tree on the side of the field.  We watched him for a few more minutes and then left, not wanting to harass him anymore.  After we got home we looked it up in the Peterson’s Field Guide and determined it was a great horned owl.  So we have owls at the farm!  Now just to hang out one night and be able to listen to them!