If you look at the photo on the left, you see a healthy young owl. You also see a bird from the Arctic that knows nothing about roads. Here it sits in the middle of Emerson Avenue…a busy two lane blacktop north of Parkersburg.

The photo on the right shows the same bird but notice his right wing. It’s now much lower and the bird is remarkably thinner. My birder friend, Julie Zickefoose, surmised it had been injured in some way in the two weeks between pictures and could no longer hunt properly. It turns out, she was correct. Someone came forward this week to say he had hit this snowy owl up on Emerson Avenue when it swooped down in front of him. Mystery solved.

People continued to encroach on the owl’s personal space, interrupting its sleep and stressing it out with their closeup selfies even after being warned away. A decision was made and the owl was rescued by the Avian Conservation Center of Appalachia for rehab.

I’m glad the bird has half a chance to survive. I have no idea what the future will be for this magnificent creature, but at least uninformed locals aren’t trying to throw a coat over it and stuff it in a box. ❤️

UPDATE: Injured owl in Vienna rescued by Avian Conservation Center http://www.thenewscenter.tv/content/news/Arctic-Snowy-Owl-visits-Vienna-465065953.html

“The righteous care for the needs of their animals, but the kindest acts of the wicked are cruel.”
‭‭Proverbs‬ ‭12:10‬ NIV

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I love how Facebook can bring folks together that may never meet otherwise. That’s the case of Julie Zickefoose and me. When I was writing posts about the spring bird migration at the farm, a mutual friend “introduced” me to Julie. She is an artist and recently came out with a lovely book called Baby Birds. An artist’s view into the nests of birds in the Appalachian foothills of Ohio.

I was especially intrigued this spring when Julie took in a baby blue jay that had ended up on the ground below the nest and whose parents never showed up. She named her Jemima and taught us all how difficult it is to hand raise a wild baby bird. We watched with fascination as she fed her baby chopped up chicken and meal worms. We held our breath as Jemima learned to fly. We watched with mixed emotions as the fledgling was released into the wild, only to return to the safety of “her tree and feeder” time and again. Jemima is fully grown now but her pin feathers didn’t developed correctly because she was hours away from death by starvation when she arrived so she can’t fly very far till she molts next spring and grows new feathers.

Julie recently returned from a long awaited birding trip to Ecuador. On her way to the airport, she heard about a juvenile Snowy Owl that had made its way from the Arctic to the Mid-Ohio Valley, taking up residence along a creek near the mall in our little burg. Upon her return, she spent all day Monday observing the magnificent bird…and all the people who wanted to get close enough to take pictures. She was interviewed on the evening news and cautioned the public to give the bird space to rest. Here is the link to her story that was on her blog yesterday. It’s very well written and gives you the up close view you crave, but with a telephoto lens. I’ve seen a snowy owl once before. I haven’t gone to see this bird. For one thing, I’ve been under the weather all week. But, more importantly, this bird needs its space and it doesn’t need more people disturbing it. I’ll “see” it the same way you do…through Julie’s eyes. ❤️

http://juliezickefoose.blogspot.com/2017/12/parkersburgs-snowy-owl.html

“You may eat any clean bird. But these you may not eat: the eagle, the vulture, the black vulture, the red kite, the black kite, any kind of falcon, any kind of raven, the horned owl, the screech owl, the gull, any kind of hawk, the little owl, the great owl, the white owl, the desert owl, the osprey, the cormorant, the stork, any kind of heron, the hoopoe and the bat.”
‭‭Deuteronomy‬ ‭14:11-18‬ ‭NIV‬‬

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