An Owl Ally

 Although I’m primarily a gardener, I’m for the birds, too.  Master Gardener Richard Demick shares this story.

“I was very happy to see a special visitor in the backyard in mid-November. I was at the kitchen counter cooking at about ten in the morning. I looked up from my project and there was a Barred Owl sitting in the river birch tree about 50 feet across the yard.  I stopped what I was doing and ran for the camera. Thankfully the owl visitor waited for my return. I got a couple shots before it dropped off the branch in a long, low swoop heading for the neighbors’ spruce trees.

The Barred Owl call, which I didn’t hear, is said to sound like “Who Cooks For You? Who Cooks For You All?! This is one of more than a dozen Barred Owl calls ranging from a “siren call” to a “wail” to a “monkey call.”  We had seen signs of a “big bird” out back the past few weeks. One day it was seen dropping from an old white pine and sweeping up into the poplars in the wetland. Another day it flew from the back lawn followed by two small companions into the nearby woods. Seen from the back flying away it was a dark colored bird with large wings.

I haven’t seen an owl in years. This was a real treat. It may also be the solution to clearing the lawn and garden beds of an explosion of voles, mice and moles. The vole tunnels run from the native border along the brook across the lawn into the catmint and lady’s mantle perennial border. The steep lawn along Route 43 has conical piles of soil that look like mole excavations. There are spots in the lawn proper where your foot sinks as though stepping on a soft mattress. More vole activity?

Then the problem expands into the garden shed. Chicken feed is stored in plastic bins. An avant-garde chicken coop is attached to the shed. Three gasoline powered yard machines are stored in the shed. Today I started the snowblower and a cup full of oat seeds blew out of the muffler. Lifting up the garden tractor seat exposed another cache of seeds. The yellow bucket hanging from the ceiling used for oil change collection also contained oat seeds.

Oat seeds are in the scratch feed for the chickens. They prefer the cracked corn and don’t eat the oat seeds. The mice are collecting the uneaten seeds from the chicken run or are getting them directly from the plastic bins. A trap was set but not strong enough to eliminate the seed savers. So, no human solution to the destructive rodent activity yet.

I’m hoping the Barred Owls will clear the lawn and garden beds of voles, mice, and moles. Traps, screen and weather stripping will help with the mouse invasion in the garden shed. Sorry to go the trap route but mouse damage to power equipment is costly to repair and if unnoticed can totally destroy a gasoline engine.”