Great Horned Owl Fledglings On The Farm

This morning I met some of my relatives out on Antelope Island and in our conversation the subject of the Great Horned Owls on our family farm in nw Montana (by Glacier NP) came up.  I haven’t visited the farm yet this summer and our conversation reminded me of how much I miss the place (and the owls).  So I decided to do a post of some images I’ve taken in the past of fledgling GHO’s on the farm.  I’ve posted some photos of a couple of these birds in the past but they were different images.

The owls have been resident on the farm for many years now and everyone up there loves them and watches out for them.  When the youngsters fledge you just never know where they will turn up in the early mornings and evenings.  They do a lot of exploring around the old barns, granaries and farm equipment.

 

1/800, f/8, ISO 400, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

Sometimes the setting I find them in is both rustic and cluttered with old metal and farm machinery.

 

 

 1/800, f/5.6, ISO 500, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

Other times they perch in the openings of old barns and  granaries which usually gives me a black background which I like.  When there’s no direct sunlight on the wood the color tones are cool.

The staple diet of these owls is Richardson’s Ground Squirrels (we’ve always just called them”gophers”).   Here you can see fresh gopher blood dripping down the wood from the last meal of one of the owls.

 

 

 1/1000, f/8, ISO 400, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

 The cool tones of the shaded wood are warmed up dramatically in direct morning or evening light.

 

 

 1/1000, f/8, ISO 400, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

 This fledgling had something wrong with its left eye and kept it half-open most of the time.

 

 

 1/640, f/6.3, ISO 500, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

This particular bird had a penchant for perching on an old ladder leading up to a kids elevated “fort” built years ago.

 

 

 1/30, f/5.6, ISO 500, 500 f/4, 1.4 tc

In the end, in writing this post, I decided to include a shot that I have posted before, long ago – just to illustrate the surprising places you sometimes find these youngsters in the mornings.  I’d come out looking for them in the pre-dawn and didn’t even have my camera with me because it was so dark for photography (darker than it looks here) when I spotted this fledgling perched on an old, junked motorcycle.  I quickly ran back to the house to get my gear and only had time for a couple of shots before it flew off.  I’m amazed this came out as well as it did while hand holding the 500mm with tc in this light and getting only 1/30 sec.

For sentimental reasons (long story), this is one of my favorite images of all time.

Ron