Eyes Open

We hope to be back to blogging the owlets' progress more frequently. This afternoon (4/28), Mrs. Owl left the box for 2 minutes around 3pm and again around 4pm. She sat in the entryway or up on the perch several times in the afternoon, including a 40 minute doorway sit from 4:20-5:00pm. We don't really know why. Most likely, it was getting too hot in there. We saw her doing some gular flapping (owl panting), in which her throat moves in and out to cool her body.
At least one of the owlets now has open eyes.
With the warm weather and the owlets' increased size, she can now leave them for longer without them getting chilled. She left several times during the evening, starting with 20 minutes at 8:21. This, and her afternoon perch sitting was the best time to get good views of the owlets down below. She returned from her long break with a gecko. She was able to feed a blind snake that Mr. Owl delivered in one piece to an owlet. Earlier she had been tearing up larger prey items. Blind snakes are about earthworm-size, so they are fairly easy to swallow. It seems that Mrs. Owl has begun limited hunting, too. Sometimes she left the box and came back with prey items. We think we can tell the difference between his visits and hers, because she will usually get down on the floor with the owlets and stay a few minutes. When he comes, he will either deliver the prey item to her if she is in the box. If she is not, he will stay up fairly high, and lean down to offer the item to the owlets. Sometimes if the prey is too big or difficult to grasp, he will leave again with the item.

More Feedings

The night started with 2 lizards and a gecko early on. There were a good number of feedings all evening so far. It still looks like only 1 hatchling so far.
I think we haven't mentioned before that a couple of weeks ago something seems to have happened to 1 of the eggs, as we saw her eating the shell. Probably got broken in the comings and goings. We have twice in the past found unhatched eggs in the box, so hatching is never a 100% guarantee.

4/18 Blind Snake

These are from 1 night ago 4/18. The hatching hasn't yet happened here. In the first photo, you can see Mr. Owl delivering a long Texas Blind Snake. That night, there were 36 feedings! This is quite a lot more than we have counted a couple of weeks back in the season.

Hatch!

We had our first hatching. It seems like it was tonight, because we didn't see anything but eggs earlier, but we can't be sure, because it could have been hiding close to the camera. You can see the fuzzy white head and body, plus a bit of wing definition in the first photo. Also, the feedings have stepped up a lot, with Mr. Owl delivering at least 10 meals between sundown and midnight. After each feeding, Mrs. Owl, bends down and tears it up to feed it to the hatchling. This is different from her usual gulping behavior, when she is only feeding herself.

Feeding

Our busy-ness is coming to a close soon, so we'll try to blog more. Here is Mr. Owl delivering a moth. The eggs should be just a few days from hatching now, and we'll let you know when they turn from round, shiny white objects to mostly round, fuzzy white objects.

Food Deliveries

We've been trying to catch up on the activities and bring you some interesting images. Starting with Friday night, 4/9, Mrs. Owl left the box for 15 minutes from 8:11-8:24pm
Then she was fed about once an hour: 9:54, 10:37, 11:26pm, 12:22 am (big spider. photo 1), and 1:38 (gecko. photo 2). She didn't get any more deliveries that night, but she did leave from 4:08-4:11am and 6:47 – 6:53am, so hopefully one of those outings was a larger food delivery.

She passed the day 4/10 in the box incubating, without a lot of preening. She did not go up in the doorway or leave at all in the evening, as she usually does. Food deliveries were pretty good all evening.
8:32 (blind snake. photo 4), 8:59 (small item), 9:43 (insect), 10:18 (insect), 10:22 (moth), 10:49 (big spider).

Blind snakes are fun prey to watch. They are very long, and are slurped down like a long spaghetti noodle.

Still Incubating

Apologies for not updating our blog more frequently. Our house remodel has become very complicated and has taken a lot of our time. We haven't had the time to review the captured pictures and write our blog. Mrs. Owl went out from 8:21-8:30 tonight, but has not been fed in the box all evening. Hopefully she was given a good meal by her mate during her outing, because it has been slim pickings tonight.

Busy

We've had a busy week and haven't updated much. Mrs. Owl is working on a decent-sized bird, which is now cached in the box. She splits her time between eating from it and incubating the eggs. You can see the bird in the third picture.

It's Four, And a Bird

On Sunday the 28th, Mrs. Owl spent all day in the box. She did give us a glimpse that clearly showed 4 eggs in the box (second photo).
In the eveing, she went up at 8pm, and left from 8:06-8:17 pm. She is taking shorter and shorter breaks.

Mr. Owl started feeding her soon after she got back. He fed her at 8:26, 8:29, 8:39 (moth), 8:48 (spider), 9:21 (lizard), 1:30am (bird). You can see the bird delivered in the first photo. We can't tell what species it is, as it is too ruffled, and is likely missing its head. She proceeded to eat it, and continued munching on it over next 1.5 hours. She received no other food deliveries until 7:06am (lizard or grasshopper).
Her morning break was from 6:06-6:12 Monday morning. Very short.
She spent all day incubating and turning the eggs, and preening, which is all she does all day.

Possibly Four Eggs

We may have 4 eggs. This snapshot seems to show a shadow on the leftmost egg that could be a 4th egg. We'll have to hope for a reshuffling of the eggs so we can get a better view.

During the night, Mrs. Owl had an interesting encounter with a cockroach that got in the nestbox. She noticed it, and tracked it (photo 2), and then tried to lunge for it (photo 3). But the perches seemed to get in the way, and it escaped out the top of the door.
Mrs. Owl had a fairly ordinary night, however, with no feedings after midnight. She did leave from 12:00-12:08am, so perhaps she was given some food then. Her morning outing was from 6:08-6:32, a bit earlier than usual.

Incubation Continues

Mrs. Owl is continuing her incubation with relatively few feedings from Mr. Owl. Last night, she was only fed 3 times after midnight (3:50, 6:02, and 6:30). However, she did leave for 15 minutes in the middle of the night (4:19), so she may have gone out to share a larger meal, such as a bird or rodent. She took her morning outing from 6:55 to 7:09 am.
She spent a typical day in the box, preening, turning around, and dozing. I noticed that she seems to doze in 1 / 2 hour doses, then moves around for a while or preens, and then dozes again.
Saturday evening, she left for half an hour, from 8:01 to 8:32. It looked like she had 3 eggs, but they are pretty close to the bottom of the view, so we can't be sure whether or not she laid a 4th today. She had been laying one every 2 days up through March 25th, so if a 4th were to be laid, today would have been the expected date. But we have seen variation and delays in the past, so nothing is certain.
This evening (Saturday), so far, she has been fed 5 times, in two batches between 8:38 and 9:02, and then 11:02 – 11:03. They mostly were too small to identify, though one looked a bit bigger, perhaps grasshopper-sized.

Looks Like Three

This shot from an overnight food delivery looks like three eggs. One is a little forward, mostly off-camera, but it does look like an egg-shaped shadow.

Three?

There are two bits of news tonight. First, we believe there are now three eggs. The last picture in the group shows that most convincingly, although it could be just a shadow of something else.

The second news is that Mr. Owl has started feeding his mate, and she appears to be in 24x7 incubation mode. She left only once Wednesday morning, for an hour from 5:52 to 7:06 am She was in the box all day, never going up into the entranceway, except to leave for 25 minutes from 8:19 to 8:45 pm. She has been in the box all evening so far, the first pre-midnight incubation session. Mr. Owl was very diligent, feeding her 5 times in 25 minutes, between 9:05 and 9:30. It appeared to be small items like insects, as we only once got a glimpse of anything much in her bill. However, whatever cache of food he had discovered dried up, as he only came back for one more feeding, this between 11:00 and midnight.
Stay tuned. Hopefully we'll get a better look at the eggs when she leaves for her morning outing.

Eyes

Mrs. Owl spent most of the day in the box, returning at 12:35 am. She did a lot of preening. You can see in the last photo how she closes her eyes while she preens. This is very important, for her eyes are her life. As a predator, if she suffered an eye injury, even if temporary, it could be fatal, as she would have great difficulty hunting. I've put some good pictures of eyes in tonight's blog.

Actually, for the next 6 weeks, she is mostly off the hook, as her mate will be doing most or all of the hunting once she starts incubating 24 hours a day. He is not yet coming to the box with food, so it is not yet clear whether she is still doing her own hunting. She left for 2 periods after midnight, from 2:12 – 3:58 am, and from 5:50 – 7:02 a.m. During this time, she may have hunted, or she may have just gone out to receive some food that her mate had found. This combined with her long break from sunset to 12:35 a.m. at the beginning of the night would have given her over 7 hours to hunt.

During the day, she sat in the entryway once from 3:23 – 3:29pm, and then again at 7:07 pm before her 7:47 pm departure. Tonight was cloudy, so 7:47 served as dusk. We had a big rainstorm tonight, and she stayed out in it. This is the second time she has stayed out in a big downpour. She doesn't seem to use the box as shelter from rain, as one would think she would. It doesn't seem that she could do much hunting in the rain, and why would she want to be out in it? Perhaps she shields herself under a leaf canopy or an overhanging branch. However, the wind in tonight's rain would have still rendered her pretty wet. Only she knows. Maybe cockroaches come out in the rain and make for good snacks.

Still only 2 eggs. If she lays more, the next will probably come tomorrow. 2 days apart is quite normal.