There's no more enchanting sound in nature than the nighttime hooting of great horned owls. And most of us living in North America are fortunate to hear them, as the birds dwell almost everywhere on the continent. However I was recently surprised to discover that the shrieking skeeeets I was hearing nightly this summer in Prescott were also the vocalizations of these beautiful birds.
In fact I met the two screamers early in the season, just as monsoon clouds started gathering for the first time on a humid evening shortly before sunset. I had hiked to a neighborhood trailhead that leads into Prescott National Forest to get a better view of the menacing skies from a higher vantage point. Intimidating flashes of lighting and bursts of thunder emanating from dark clouds eventually cut my walk short. But just before I left the trail, two caterwauling birds drew my attention.
I quicky spotted them roosting atop adjacent juniper trees near homes lining the forest border. The birds were somewhere in size between ravens and scrub jays, the two largest birds I regularly see in that area. The creatures' thick, compact shapes quickly identified them as great horned owls.
Their skeeeets seemed like cries of agitation. Did I add to any stress as I tried to approach them to shoot photographs with my iPhone? Possibly, because they soon flew away, disappearing into the neighborhood. No worries, as I'd hear those calls again and again throughout the warm summer.
Starting in late June, through all of July and August, and even now into the beginning of September, the nights were filled with these cries. At first I couldn't imagine they were really owls. I wanted to believe these noble birds only vocalized with soothing hooh-HOOHs, the lullabies that have rocked me back to sleep when I've awakened in the middle of the night from a bad dream.
In reality, those hooting songs either advertise territory or communicate with a mate. The screeches on the other hand were the calls of young owls begging for food. So it's quite possible those two owls I witnessed in June were adolescents, only recently fledged from nests, still calling for parents.
A few years ago, several miles away in Watson Woods, I encountered another pair of owlets in early June, Velcroed together on a tree branch . I might now surmise that spring is a popular nesting time for great horned owls in Prescott. Those juveniles were not far from a parent whose wide eyes focused on their AND my every movement. I suspect mature owls in my neighborhood this summer are watching over their own young in the same way.
Just a week ago, close to dusk, the squawks of acorn woodpeckers alerted me to some commotion in my Prescott front yard. The birds were angry at two great horned owls perched close together in one of my pine trees. They looked nervous, disturbed by the woodpeckers, and then by me photographing them. They quickly flew out of sight, into a denser grove of trees across the street. I soon heard a skeeeet from that general direction, confirming they were the summer noisemakers.
The inseparable owlets might depend on their parents for several more months as the juveniles learn to hunt on their own. As a result, the shrieks might very well continue well into autumn. These frequent calls aren't an annoyance by any stretch, they're a testament to the joyful success of this owl family in my neighborhood.
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| Young great horned owls in my Prescott yard in early September. |
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| Young great horned owls in my Prescott yard in early September. |
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