The highlight of my week was seeing a pair of Great Horned Owls on my evening walk. I got a late start, waiting for the day to cool. Approaching the stop sign at the end of my road, I noticed the quiet. It was much moreso than usual. I had waited long enough for my walk that the traffic on the roads had quieted. There were no golf carts puttering around the neighborhood, no lawnmowers or weed eaters running, no children laughing and playing. No dogs barking. Everyone seemed to be already inside having dinner, doing homework, or preparing for the following day. There was likely only thirty or forty minutes of daylight left. Suddenly, from the woods directly across the road, a pair of great horned owls broke the quiet. They were close. “Hoo… Hoo Hoo, Hooooo” . It’s a distinctive sound, much cleaner, calm, and more haunting than that of the more commonly heard barred owl’s rough and raucous voice.
I turned left down the road that joined ours, all the while turning my head to the right to try and locate the owls in the branches of the water oaks as they continued calling back and forth to each other. Finally after walking another 50 yards or so and turning back, there it was, perched on the end of an oak limb, facing me. Big bodied, the distinctive ear tufts visible, the great bird watched me as I watched him. Somewhere deeper into the foliage of the woods another great horned owl called. A mate? No, not likely this time of year. More probably a rival. Fall is the time of year in which great horned owls begin their courtship. The males are setting up territories and letting each other know who owns what with their deep, hooting calls.
I watched the bird for a few moments. He was standing his ground, clinging to the oak limb with those shiny, black, sharp, lethal talons. I turned and continued my walk as he and the other owl continued to fill the woods with their voices. Imagine the chill it must send down the spine of every squirrel, rabbit, or mouse within earshot. I walked to the end of the road and turned right. Eventually, with distance, the voices of the owls faded in the woods behind me.
I walked my mile and three quarters route back around to the owls, hoping they would still be active in the day’s fading. Sure enough, I could hear them still calling as I approached. There was no owl on the oak limb where it had been before but scanning just to the left I saw the owl perched at the very top of a dead pine snag devoid of limbs. His body was sideways to me but his head was rotated toward me and he peered at me with those great yellow eyes.
All sorts of folklore surrounds owls and their appearance in the daylight hours. Some superstitions regarded such sightings as a bad omen or a portent of illness. Some Native American tribes viewed them as guardians, protectors, or a sign of good luck. On The Andy Griffith Show, the Darling family believed that if a single fellow saw an owl in the daylight, the next woman he saw was destined to be his bride. The only thing that could break this spell would be seeing yet another owl in the daylight. Another interpretation of a diurnal owl sighting is that they represent a transition or the end of one phase of life and the fresh start of a new one. Others believe that an owl revealing itself in the daylight is nature’s way of elbowing you in the ribs to say, “get ready, pay attention, trust your instincts”. I favor the myth interpreting owls as bearers of hidden truths, representing clarity coming to the surface or the arrival of resolution to a problem.
I am not certain what that owl may or may not have been carrying with him that day. As he turned his head from me, I saw the black silhouette of his body puffed out against the evening sky at the top of that snag. No leaves behind him to obscure his perfect profile. He leaned forward, tail up, feathers raised, and from somewhere deep within him, he let out a four-note, hooting call. The whole world shrunk to that sublime moment. He sat there for a few more seconds in the silence. Another owl called nearby. I watched as the dark silhouette leaped from the snag and flew silently on those fringed feathers deeper into the dim woods while the daylight faded.
