Swung by Shaver’s Creek on my way to vaccine number 2. I was largely there by myself so I got to talk to the worker for about an hour about all their animals. They’ve got amazing huge and well built aviaries that make me jealous, but they still don’t make for good photos, but I tried my best.
Starting with the Shortie, I wasn’t even aware they had one. He is pretty new. His pen was mostly blocked by a tarp to give extra privacy while he adjusts to public life. I didn’t even know it was in there and I skipped it, as I thought it was under construction or it was dear departed Pip’s enclosure. The worker pointed it out to me thankfully!
They’re pretty uncommon here, and the only one I’ve seen was one in a museum, stuffed. It was much smaller than my brain was picturing, which is all my fault. My love for them made them larger than life. It reminded me of a more potato shaped football (the American football).
He lost his eye from an injury and he lives here now.
They don’t do any rehab here anymore, so they are just an education center. The upside for them is they get to handle all the animals and be more friendly with them than I do as a rehab volunteer. She showed me pics of their GHO sitting on her lap and she said they take their fancy crane out for daily walks.
I have pet cockatiels, and had read that three was a difficult number to keep because typically two make friends and one is left excluded. Interesting to see a similar dynamic described in a completely different bird species.
I was wondering if it was a safety/privacy issue. While owls are usually monogamous, they don’t typically hang out like in the photo outside of nesting season. They will allow the mate to stay in their territory, but that’s the usual extent of socialization.
I was wondering if there was a worry if one of them paired with the male, the other female (females are the larger sex) there would be conflicts between the females. That way if one of them chose the male, they would potentially be fighting regardless.