In search of Beautiful Barn Owls....

I have always thought barn owls were beautiful. This love was rather strangely started with a stuffed barn owl that took pride of place in our Primary school classroom. The poor bird had met with an accident  but was beautifully mounted and gave a lot of country children a chance to admire such a beautiful creature up close. I have had a fondness for them ever since.

My older brother has obviously shared this smitten'ness as now he has a five acre field the first thing he has done is build an owl box. It is a very sturdy piece of work that he built himself at Christmas he then chose an Oak tree and fastened it securely and waited.

I was quite surprised at the size and heft of the box ...but thinking about it's intention to replace the nesting opportunities provided by a barn ...perhaps I should not have been.

Any way this week he sent me a photo of the box in place, and being a bit busy I thought "very nice, but I've seen this before" after a few cups of tea and a sudden thought I went back to his picture and enlarged it.
Now I'll have to ask if this owl has decided to stay!

  If you have never seen a Barn Owl in flight here is a beautiful video from the BBC.

Didn't he do well :o)