![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/short-eared-owl-5264-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"short-eared-owl-5264-ron-dudley\\"")
1\/2500, f\/7.1, ISO 400, Canon 7D Mark II,\u00a0Canon EF 500mm f\/4L IS II USM, not baited, set up or called in<\/em><\/p>\nThe spring of 2016 was a good breeding season for local Short-eared Owls and correspondingly for this bird photographer. In May of that year I spent some time with this recently fledged youngster and its darker sibling in Box Elder County. Both birds were fearless and curious which is typical of this species at this age but that combination isn’t necessarily a good one.<\/p>\n
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![\"\"](\"https:\/\/featheredphotography.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/short-eared-owl-1335-ron-dudley.jpg\" "\\"short-eared-owl-1335-ron-dudley\\"")
1\/2000, f\/7.1, ISO 400, Canon 7D, Canon EF 100-400mm f\/4.5-5.6L IS II USM @ 400mm, not baited, set up or called in<\/p>\n
At one point I caught the young bird doing a leisurely wing stretch. I was too close to avoid clipping its wingtip but in this case I don’t think the clipped wing is an image-killer.<\/p>\n
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But there was a problem and it was related to why I was so close to the bird. Both of the very young owls were perched very close to a road – far too close for their own safety. I’d estimate they were only about 6′ from the edge of the pavement. The road was fairly remote and didn’t have a lot of traffic but it was paved and some of that traffic, including large trucks, typically travels much too fast so the situation was a potential disaster. Young SEOW’s at this age love to roam which is why they were here in the first place. They could be out in the middle of the road within seconds.<\/p>\n
What to do about it, if anything? One option was to pull up very close to the owls in my pickup in hopes it would scare them back into the thick grasses and relative safety, which is what I’d already done and it explains why I was so close to the birds. But my very close presence had no effect on these fearless young owls. Another option would be to get out of my pickup and shoo them back into the vegetation and even handle them physically if I had to. But I was very uncomfortable with doing that for reasons that should be obvious. A third option was to leave them be and hope they’d retreat to safety on their own.<\/p>\n
In the end I chose the latter and drove down the road to look for other birds but I was nervous about having made the wrong decision. Perhaps 90 minutes later I returned to the same area and both young birds were gone, apparently after retreating to the safety of the thick vegetation.<\/p>\n
Had I made a wise choice? I don’t necessarily think so, it was only lucky. Had I returned and found one or two dead owls on the road I’d have regretted that choice for the rest of my life.<\/p>\n
It made me think of what bird and wildlife rehabbers go through – having to make life and death decisions about their vulnerable and helpless patients on a daily basis. Personally I couldn’t handle that stress and the inevitable second-guessing.<\/p>\n
Which is one of the many reasons I admire rehabbers as much as I do.<\/p>\n
Ron<\/p>\n
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Sometimes there are no easy choices when you find a vulnerable bird in a potentially dangerous situation.<\/p>\n