February 8, 2010

Owl Prowl

By Judi Janofsky and Rich Steck

This is the first of a three-part series involving Wilderness Wildlife Week, an eight-day hiking and lecture event held each January in Pigeon Forge, TN.

Searching for the elusive owl in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is always a difficult challenge. Doing it in 23-degree weather on snow-covered paths makes it an even more test of wills. On a normal night - and yes, the only way to spot these nocturnal birds is at night when they're on their prowl for food - the guides usually spot one about 10% of the time. With 12 of us announcing our arrival with each crunch on the snow, these birds would be even more difficult to spot.

Spotting a Barred Owl takes time and patience.

We'd signed up to do this "Owl Prowl" as part of Wilderness Wildlife Week in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, an annual event that highlights the Great Smoky Mountains National Park and the great outdoors.

↓ Continued from front page of Where To GO Next!

It sounded like an interesting and informative way to spend an evening when we were contemplating it from our warm cozy house in Atlanta. Now that we were actually there, outside in this cold with overcast skies, we definitely were having second thoughts. Especially when we knew the chance was slim to none that we'd spot anything.

"Don't worry," said our guide Steve Garr. "Even if we don't see one, we almost always hear one."

Hear one?, we thought. We know what they sound like. "Who, Who, Who", right?

But evidently the call is not that simple. Owls don't all sound alike.

Apparently we were in Barred Owl territory and Steve started by pretending to be one entering this part of the park. It started as a throaty sound, a series of eight to nine hoots that sounds like "who-cooks-for-you, who-cooks-for-you-all."

Really, that's what it sounds like. With nearby city lights lightening up the overcast sky, 12 sets of eyes scanned the treetops looking for a flying silhouette, a Barred Owl who would come to challenge Steve over his territory.

But either there were no Barreds in the area or Steve's "who-cooks-for-you" just wasn't challenging enough to start a turf war this night.

With no vocal response or physical sightings, we moved further into the woods.

It wouldn't be difficult to spot a Barred Owl, it's one of the largest of the species. About 1-1/2 to 2 feet tall, it has a large head with big brown eyes, concentric rings around a pale face. And while it weights just two pounds because most of its feathers are as light as down - it looks quite large and in flight it - with a 40-50 inch wingspan - it looks more like a dangerous hawk than a sweet-faced owl. And while you'd think they'd be easy to spot flying across the sky, their light feathers are constructed in such a way that they don't produce any sound while flying, helping them quietly swoop down on unaware prey.

What's really interesting about the Barred is that the females are bigger than the male. She needs her size to protect the nest and babies, while he goes out to hunt to feed them. And he better be good at it because if he comes home empty handed, she'll be just hungry enough to eat him for supper.

After our fourth stop and more hooting from Steve, we saw a black shadow move across the sky and into a nearby tree. It was a Barred Owl. A little later it came closer, obviously wanting to protect his territory by chasing Steve away. And not even the sounds of Screech Owls in the distance could entice us to move from our spot.

Against all odds, we saw that Barred three times. Not too bad for a bunch of city slickers in the woods.

For more information on Wilderness Wildlife Week, which is scheduled for January 5 to 15, 2011, visit www.mypigeonforge.com.