Its 4am and Athene will be
waiting for me. She will have been there all night, sitting bolt upright, eyes staring.
She doesn’t speak, or make any sound, but she hears everything, like it’s
amplified through festival speakers. I am her mother and she is a beautiful, but strange child.
She is waiting for her meal of raw meat, which she will swallow without
chewing. She rise up in a dance of defense when I go to her, threatening to attack. In case you haven’t guessed, Athene,
is an owl.
I received a call last Monday
morning for my local vet. They had a tawny owl chick in the surgery, and could
I please collect and care for it. I have been mum to, among many others, lambs,
and puppies, humans and jackdaws, mice
and even ants. I have not had the privilege of looking after an owl. I found
the prospect slightly daunting. Athene however, trusted me, and gazing up with
her enormous inquisitive eyes, gladly ate the meal I offered her of chopped up
day old chicken meat. Ten days on, I can report she is probably the best
behaved baby I have had.
Her wings are growing, she is learning
to fly, and one day soon she will return to the wild..
Owls are much better at being parents
to baby owls than I am. I am a diligent and loving adoptive , mum but her own
mum would have known how to hunt mice, where to look for the best prey, the
flight paths through the woods, how to
climb up a vertical tree trunk, using your wings and talons and crucially when
to sleep.
I feed Athene very early in the
morning and late at night and sometimes during the day. When I feed her in
daylight hours, she is full of sleep, her huge brown eyes blinking at me. At
night she is alert and ready for action, but we are all out for the count. It
must be hard being an owl baby in a human family.
One problem that can make life
difficult for tawny owl families and increase the risk of chicks finding
themselves on the ground, is lack of suitable nest sites. Grandfather trees
with wide trunks with hollow interiors are rare. So, after making ten nest
boxes for smaller birds early this year, Salvador (aged six) and uncle David
are going into production making owl nest boxes. Whatever fate befalls Athene
when she leaves us for the wild night, she won’t be short of a suitable home to
raise her chicks, when the time comes.
It is against the law to keep a
tawny owl chick unless you intend to release it. It is also illegal to do
anything to that chick that may hinder its release to the wild. That of course
would include taming her too much. It’s
a fine line between leaving her alone so that she doesn’t habituate to humans
and giving her some company and stimulation so that she doesn’t become bored.
So it’s a relief that Athene is not scared by my presence and will happily eat
her dinners, but maintains a healthy disdain for being picked up or bothered.
She clacks her beak which when she arrived all fluffy and hunched over seemed a
little pitiful as a defence, but now she is bigger and sat on her perch she is
more menacing. She also extends out her wings and dances from side to side if
she feels really threatened, which is an impressive sight. She is in a way,
both baby and heroine, frightened sometimes and also a little frightening with
her huge staring eyes, powerful talons and that confidence only true predators
hold.
I look forward to the day when
Athene will fly free into the woods surrounding our home. Until then I will go
to her in the early hours, called by her gleaming eyes and fluffy head. With
her intelligence and courage Athene has won our hearts and admiration. She is
well-named.
Also this week, Phoebe, our
sheep, who we raised from an orphaned lamb into a fine ewe has become a
mummy.... but that is another story, soon to be told.
Sasha x
